Design of stimuli-responsive materials from a diblock copolymer with association between dissimilar monomers

Recently, stimuli-responsive materials have drawn tremendous attention due to their structures and properties and also due to their smart responses to changes in surrounding environment. In this work, we suggest the design of such materials based on associating A-b-B diblock copolymers. The free energy for the copolymer in the bulk state is first obtained as the perturbed hard sphere chains subject to adhesive potential between dissimilar monomers. Through Gaussian thread approach, the free energy functional is formulated to include effective local interactions from the excess equation of state. The random-phase approximation and self-consistent field analyses are to be readily elicited from the functional. It is demonstrated using these field approaches that the manipulation of disparity in self contact interactions and thermoreversibility of association can yield a variety of nasoscale mesophases upon cooling, heating, pressurization, and depressurization. In addition, micellization and reverse micellization in the solutions of the copolymer in selective solvents are to be probed via the manipulation of cross contact interactions and association. We will also discuss the applicability of such smart materials to various areas.