Polymer Crystallization at Curved Liquid/Liquid Interface

Polymeric micro/nanoparticles have attracted significant interest in the past few decades due to their relevance in a number of fields. The methods commonly employed tend to provide particles that have simple morphology of spheres or cylinders that are inherently fluidic and dynamic due to the long chain nature of macromolecules. As more complex particles, in function and structure, are emerging as solutions to a variety of problems, simple and versatile methods to obtain them are a necessity. Towards this aim, our group has developed a miniemulsion crystallization process where polymer single crystal-like growth is confined to a dynamic liquid/liquid interface. This process produces unique hollow polymer capsules termed “crystalsomes” that have excellent mechanical properties compared to their amorphous counterpart the polymersome. This talk will focus upon controlling the crystalsome structure and morphology by programing the growth condition as well as co-crystallization of carefully selected amphiphilic block co-polymers in the miniemulsion process. It will be shown by altering the hydrophobic monomeric unit, the crystallization temperature, and the particle size a variety of crystalsomes with tunable porosity can be obtained. Detailed formation mechanisms will be discussed.