Mechanical, thermal, and microstructural analyses of thermoplastic poly(2-methoxyethyl acrylate)-based polyurethane by RAFT and polyaddition

Mechanical and thermal properties of the newly synthesized solid poly(2-methoxyethyl acrylate) (PMEA)-based polyurethane (PU) were studied. The obtained PMEA-based PUs with various molecular weights were thermoplastic, synthesized by reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) and polyaddition. Dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) revealed that the storage modulus and the melting temperature of PMEA-based PU significantly increased from 1.5 × 104 Pa to 2.3 × 105 Pa and from 25 °C to 73 °C, respectively, as the molecular weight of PMEA-based PU increased. This enhancement in the properties could be due to the formation of an ordered structure in PMEA-based PU, studied using small-angle and wide angle X-ray scattering (SAXS, WAXS). Glass transition temperature, 5% weight-reduction temperature, and the amount of intermediate water of PMEA-based PU were also analyzed using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). This journal is