Dielectric spectroscopy and calorimetry in the glass transition region of semicrystalline poly(ethylene terephthalate)

Confinement of the glass-forming regions in the nanometer range influences the alpha-relaxation which is associated with the glass transition. These effects were investigated for semicrystalline poly(ethylene terephthalate) by dielectric spectroscopy and differential scanning calorimetry. The results are discussed within the concept of cooperative length, i.e. the characteristic length of the cooperative process of glass transition. Both experiments showed a dependence of the glass transition on the mean thickness of the amorphous layers. For the dielectric relaxation, the loss maximum was found to shift to higher temperatures with decreasing thickness of the amorphous layers, but no differences were observed in the curve shape for the differently crystallized samples. For the calorimetric measurements, in contrast, there was no correlation for the glass transition temperature, whereas the curve shape did correlate with the layer thickness of the mobile amorphous fraction. From the structure parameters, a characteristic length of approximately (2.5+/-1) nm was estimated for the unconfined glass relaxation (transition).