Capturing Nanoscale Structure in Network Gels by Microemulsion Polymerization

Small-angle neutron scattering and turbidity were used to probe nanoscale structure in bicontinuous microemulsions before and after polymerization. Difficulties in capturing nanoscale structure by polymerizing microemulsions have persisted with the use of thermal initiation. Bicontinuous microemulsion polymerization with a reactive surfactant monomer and cross-linker was done with only a 20% increase in repeat distance. This small increase represents better than an order of magnitude advance over previous attempts, exhibiting hundreds to thousands percent increases. Both the network gel and the precursor microemulsion were transparent and devoid of microphase separation.