title: Relaxation and Crystallization of Oriented Polymer Melts with Anisotropic Filler Networks.
abstract: The coexistence of nanofillers and shear flow can influence crystallization of polymer melts. However, the microscopic mechanism of the effect is not completely revealed yet. Thus, dynamic Monte Carlo simulations were used to study the effect of the filler networks formed by one-dimensional nanofillers on relaxation and crystallization of oriented polymer melts. The filler networks restrict the relaxation of oriented polymers and impose confinement effect on the chains inside the filler networks, resulting in higher orientation and lower conformational entropy of the inside chains compared to those of the outside chains. Thus, the confined inside chains have stronger crystallizability. During crystallization, the confined chains are nucleated on the filler surface and then form nanohybrid shish-kebab structures. Furthermore, the effect of fillers and chain orientation closely depends on some factors, such as polymer-filler interaction, filler content, and filler spacing. Our simulation results are consistent with some experimental findings. Thus, these results can provide new insights into the mechanism of crystallization of filled polymers and also guide researchers to develop new polymer nanocomposites with high performance.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Polymer Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Jiangsu University , 301 Xuefu Road, Zhenjiang 212013, China.
authors.forename: Yijing
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Nie
authors.affiliation: Institute of Polymer Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Jiangsu University , 301 Xuefu Road, Zhenjiang 212013, China.
authors.forename: Tongfan
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Hao
authors.affiliation: Institute of Polymer Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Jiangsu University , 301 Xuefu Road, Zhenjiang 212013, China.
authors.forename: Zhouzhou
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Gu
authors.affiliation: Institute of Polymer Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Jiangsu University , 301 Xuefu Road, Zhenjiang 212013, China.
authors.forename: Yue
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Institute of Polymer Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Jiangsu University , 301 Xuefu Road, Zhenjiang 212013, China.
authors.forename: Yong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Institute of Polymer Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Jiangsu University , 301 Xuefu Road, Zhenjiang 212013, China.
authors.forename: Ding
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Institute of Polymer Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Jiangsu University , 301 Xuefu Road, Zhenjiang 212013, China.
authors.forename: Ya
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wei
authors.affiliation: Institute of Polymer Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Jiangsu University , 301 Xuefu Road, Zhenjiang 212013, China.
authors.forename: Songjun
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Institute of Polymer Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Jiangsu University , 301 Xuefu Road, Zhenjiang 212013, China.
authors.forename: Zhiping
authors.identifier: 0000-0002-9550-3035
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Zhou