Speaker：Prof. Steven P. Armes，University of Sheffield

Title: POLYMERISATION-INDUCED SELF-ASSEMBLY

Time：November 28, 2019，10：00 am

Venue: Lecture Room 324, AISMST (Building #2, KeJiYuan, North Campus)

Faculties and students are warmly welcome.

School of Molecular Science and Engineering

South China Advanced Institute for Soft Matter Science and Technology

November 18, 2019

Abstract:

Polymerisation-induced self-assembly (PISA) is a highly versatile, potentially scalable platform technology that enables the efficient and rational synthesis of block copolymer nanoparticles of various morphologies directly in the form of concentrated dispersions. The basic principles of PISA are generic: a wide range of diblock copolymer nano-objects can be readily prepared in either water, ethanol or n-alkanes. In PISA, a soluble precursor 'A' block is chain-extended using a second monomer that forms an insoluble 'B' block in the chosen solvent. As this second 'B' block grows in the monomer/solvent reaction mixture, micellar nucleation occurs at some critical chain length, leading to the formation of sterically-stabilized nanoparticles. Depending on the relative volume fractions of the 'A' and 'B' blocks, the copolymer morphology can be either spheres, worms or vesicles. 

This talk will focus mainly on the RAFT aqueous dispersion polymerisation of 2-hydroxypropyl methacrylate (HPMA), which serves as a convenient model system for understanding PISA formulations.

Brief Biography：

Academic Research Record and Professional Activities. > 610 publications in refereed journals (H-index = 109; > 34,000 citations). Named inventor on 25 patents. Invited to join ten journal editorial boards, including Langmuir, Macromolecules, Biomacromolecules, Polymer Chemistry, J. Materials Chemistry, Macromol. Rapid Commun. and J. Colloid Interface Sci.

Grants, Awards and Prizes. ERC Advanced Investigator grant-holder (2013-2018). Received 45 EPSRC research grants, including 3 consecutive Platform Grants and a current £1.67 M Particle Technology Fellowship. Awarded the 2018 Royal Society Armourers & Brasiers’ Company Prize, the 2018 Macro Group UK medal, the 2017 ECIS Solvay  prize, the 2016 DSM Materials Science award, the 2014 RSC Interdisciplinary Prize, the 2013 RSC Tilden Prize, the RSC 2010 Peter Day Soft Matter award and the 2007 RSC Macro Group Medal. Delivered the RSC 2014 Thomas Graham Lecture and the 2015 Colloid & Polymer Science Lecture for the German Colloid Society. Recipient of a Royal Society/Wolfson Research Merit Award (2005-2009).