Confinement of columnar diblock copolymers: Simulations, theory and applications

The inherent nanoscale morphologies of self-organizing diblock copolymer melts are now being investigated for a variety of technological applications. To obtain global, well-oriented, regular patterns requires suitably confining and aligning the melt between two flat plates. Here we consider such confinement for an asymmetrical diblock melt, which forms columns of the minority phase in a matrix of the majority phase. We investigate this system with a combination of numerical simulations and strong segregation theory and make suggestions as to when perpendicular orientation should prevail over parallel orientation of the columns.