Small angle neutron scattering study of polyelectrolyte conformation incorporated into hybrid threadlike micelles...

A small angle neutron scattering study revealed that polyelectrolytes, sodium salts of partially sulfonated polystyrenes with narrow distributed molar masses of Mn = 27 x 10(3) and 340 x 10(3), which were incorporated into hybrid threadlike micelles formed with cetyltrimethylammonium bromide in aqueous (deuterium oxide) solutions at a quiescent state, behaved as rigid rods with lengths of 16 and 200 nm and the same radius of 2.3 approximately 2.4 nm, respectively. Under strong shear flows at shear rates much higher than the reciprocal of the mechanical relaxation time for the solution, the formed hybrid threadlike micelles were highly orientated to the shear flow axis owing to the generation of a shear induced liquid crystalline phase. The polyelectrolytes incorporated into the highly orientated micelle also maintained essentially the same conformation as those in the randomly orientated micelles in a quiescent state even at high shear rates.