Smectic Liquid Crystalline Polymer Membranes with Aligned Nanopores in an Anisotropic Scaffold.

ABSTRACT: Bottom-up methods for the fabrication of nanoporous polymer membranes have numerous advantages. However, it remains challenging to fabricate nanoporous membranes that are mechanically robust and have aligned pores, that is, with a low tortuosity. Here, a mechanically robust thin-film composite membrane was fabricated consisting of a two-dimensional (2D) porous smectic liquid crystalline polymer network inside an anisotropic, microporous polymer scaffold. The polymer scaffold allows for relatively straightforward planar alignment of the smectic liquid crystalline mixture, which consisted of a diacrylate cross-linker and a dimer forming benzoic acid-based monoacrylate. Polymerized samples displayed a smectic A (SmA) phase, which formed the eventual 2D porous channels after base treatment. Th

SUBMITTER: Houben SJA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7898271 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature