The morphologies
of the microphase-separated structures in the
binary blends of diblock copolymers (AB/AB) have been studied intensively
for the case of diblock copolymers bearing antisymmetric compositions
with similar molecular weights. Here, the two diblock copolymers 1
and 2, of which compositions are 0.5 –
x
and
0.5 +
x
(0 <
x
< 0.5), respectively,
were blended, and the morphology diagram was constructed in the plot
of χ
Z
vs the average composition of the A component,
where χ is the interaction parameter between A and B segments
and
Z
is the average degree of polymerization of
the two AB diblock copolymers. The temperature-dependent morphologies
were analyzed by synchrotron small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) measurements.
It was found that the morphology diagram agrees in principle with
the theoretical one for the neat AB diblocks by Matsen and Bates (
Macromolecules
1996
,
29
, 1091–1098),
although the disordered phase was a bit expanded in the experimentally
determined morphology diagram. Anomalous temperature dependencies
in the lamellar spacing have been also comprehensively studied for
the binary blends of antisymmetric diblock copolymers as a function
of the degree of compositional asymmetry by closely adjusting the
average composition in the blend specimen at 0.50. For this purpose,
more than 20 neat diblock copolymers have been synthesized with a
wide range of compositions from 0.20 to 0.87 and a range of molecular
weight of 12 000–33 800. The temperature dependencies
of the lamellar spacing were also analyzed by synchrotron SAXS measurements.
As a result, the following things were found. The scaling exponent
α in
D
∼
T
α
was still negative but slightly larger than the usual value (i.e.,
α = −0.33) for the smaller degree of asymmetry in the
composition (i.e.,
x
is small), while α became
positive for the higher degree of asymmetry. The latter result is
very anomalous because the temperature dependence is opposite (i.e.,
the lamellar spacing increases with an increase of temperature). The
value of α was found to be linearly rationalized with the degree
of asymmetry τ (which is especially introduced in the current
paper for this purpose), for the binary blends with the average composition
of 0.50. Based on this result, one can prepare lamellar microdomains,
of which spacing does not change with temperature, by blending two
diblock copolymers with τ = 1.33 (corresponding to 0.3 and 0.7
of compositions) having similar molecular weights. This would be important
for manufacturing materials with properties (for instance, the optical
property) independent of temperature. From the current study, the
binary blends of the antisymmetric diblock copolymers are concluded
to be versatile such that the precise controls of the morphologies
and the temperat...