Structural Change Accompanied by Plastic-to-Rubber Transition of SBS Block Copolymers

Abstract It was shown that some block copolymers and their blends with corresponding homopolymers exhibit stress softening. When the specimens are stretched beyond the yield point, they become rubbery and exhibit high elasticity and large recoverable deformation, as a result of a breakup of their original rigid structure. Moreover, the deformed specimens heal, in that the properties of the original undeformed specimens are recovered upon removal of applied stress. This effect was attributed to the reformation of the original microdomain structure. In this work, we investigated an SBS block copolymer and a blend of the copolymer with homopolystyrene in regard to the structural change accompaning the plastic-to-rubber transition and the healing process. Electron microscopy and small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) were used.