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Stress-Structure Relationship of the Reversible Associating Polymer Network under Start-up Shear Flow

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Abstract

We adopt Langevin dynamics to explore the stress-structure relationship of telechelic reversible associating polymer gel during startup shear flow, with shear strengths varying from Wi = 12.6 to Wi = 12640. At weak shear flow Wi = 12.6, the shear stress proportionally increases with shear strain at short times, followed by a strain hardening behavior and then passes through a maximum (σmax, γmax) and finally decreases until it reaches the steady state. During the evolution of stress, the gel network is only slightly broken and essentially maintains its framework, and the strain hardening behavior originates from the excessive stretching of chains. On the other hand, the stress-strain curve at intermediate shear flow Wi = 505.6 shows two differences from that at Wi = 12.6, namely, the absence of strain hardening and a dramatic increase of stress at large strains, which is caused by the rupture of gel network at small strains and the network recovery at large strains, respectively. Finally, at very strong shear flow Wi = 6319.7, the gel network is immediately broken by shear flow and the stress-strain curve exhibits similar behaviors to those of classical polymeric liquids.

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Acknowledgments

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 21873092, 21774127, 21790341, 21790342), the Key Research Program of Frontier Sciences, CAS (No. QYZDY-SSW-SLH027) and the Jilin Provincial science and technology development program (No. 20190103115JH).

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  1. College of Chemistry, Jilin University, Changchun, 130012, China

    Ai-Qing Liu

  2. State Key Laboratory of Polymer Physics and Chemistry, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun, 130022, China

    Ai-Qing Liu, Li-Jun Liu, Wen-Sheng Xu, Xiao-Lei Xu, Ji-Zhong Chen & Li-Jia An

  3. University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, China

    Li-Jia An

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Liu, AQ., Liu, LJ., Xu, WS. et al. Stress-Structure Relationship of the Reversible Associating Polymer Network under Start-up Shear Flow. Chin J Polym Sci 39, 387–396 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10118-020-2487-6

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