(119a) Structure and Dynamics of Bottlebrush Polymers in Dilute Solution

Over the past few years, bottlebrush polymers have been intensely studied as an
attractive building block for the design and manufacture of self-assembled
hierarchical soft materials. These polymers are the canonical example of thick
chains, consisting of a central backbone chain with numerous side chains densely
grafted onto it. This architecture lends additional thickness to the molecule as
well as enhancing its stiffness due to steric interaction between the side
chains. These two features give rise to very different static and dynamic
properties compared to linear polymers, e.g. dramatically reduced chain
entanglements and mechanical stiffness in melts and bottlebrush networks.

In this talk we will present results from Brownian Dynamics and Monte Carlo
simulations on bottlebrush conformations and dynamics in dilute solution,
emphasizing the role of side chain length on the intramolecular structure and
rheological properties. The dynamical simulations primarily focus on uniaxial
extensional flows, with some results for simple shear flow as well. Our
Brownian Dynamics simulations are based on bead-spring models incorporating
hydrodynamic interaction, with suitably chosen interaction potentials.
Furthermore, we discuss the elastic response of bottlebrush polymers to a
pulling force and contextualize this behavior with respect to classical entropy
elasticity of linear polymers.