This course is designed to be suitable for a wide range of technical professionals including engineers, chemists and physicists, as well as students in these disciplines. Both industrial and academic professionals should benefit. The emphasis of the course will be using shear melt rheology as a tool to characterize polymers. The most commonly used measurement techniques and the structural interpretation of the properties derived will be covered. Accurate and detailed characterization of polymer structure is important for establishing the basis of patents, controlling polymer manufacture, understanding and controlling polymer processing and is the cornerstone for any serious scientific research.
Melt rheology is one of the most sensitive tools for elucidating polymer structure.
The shapes of both viscosity and elasticity functions correlate with structural features such as molecular weight and distribution, long-chain branching, gel content, multiple phases and plasticization. This course will demonstrate how viscosity and elasticity information are utilized to calculate molecular weight distribution and how molecular weight distribution is used to calculate the viscosity and elasticity. The process of gelation leads to profound changes in the state of a fluid and these changes can be sensitively monitored with rheological methods. The presence of multiple phases greatly compounds rheological response. Some quantitative relationships will be discussed.