title: Strain hardening in startup shear of long-chain branched polymer solutions.
abstract: We show for the first time that entangled polymeric liquids containing long-chain branching can exhibit strain hardening upon startup shear. As the significant long-chain branching impedes chain disentanglement, Gaussian coils between entanglements can deform to reach the finite extensibility limit where the intrachain retraction force exceeds the value expected from the usual conformational entropy loss evaluated based on Gaussian chain statistics. The phenomenon is expected to lead to further theoretical understanding.
authors: Department of Polymer Science, Maurice Morton Institute of Polymer Science and Engineering, University of Akron, Akron, Ohio 44325-3909, USA.
authors: Gengxin
authors: G
authors: Liu
authors: Shiwang
authors: S
authors: Cheng
authors: Hyojoon
authors: H
authors: Lee
authors: Hongwei
authors: H
authors: Ma
authors: Hongde
authors: H
authors: Xu
authors: Taihyun
authors: T
authors: Chang
authors: Roderic P
authors: RP
authors: Quirk
authors: Shi-Qing
authors: SQ
authors: Wang