Course Offerings: Polymer

Basic definitions: Monomers, polymers, polymerization reactions. Polymer structure, nomenclature. Molecular weight distributions and average molecular weights. Chain conformations: End-to-end distance, radius of gyration, molecular dimensions, excluded volume. Molecular weight measurements: Colligative properties, osmometry, light scattering, viscosity, gel permeation chromatography. Step-growth polymerization. Types of reactions. Reactivity, kinetics. ...

The course starts with an introduction to the design and synthesis of polymers with define chemical structures. A number of polymerization techniques will be descried briefly, including anionic, living free radical and migration insertion polymerizations. The principles guiding self-assembly behaviour of block copolymers and other building blocks will be discussed, followed by the material applications of the assembled polymeric ...

TBA ...