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Science 21 February 1992:
Vol. 255. no. 5047, pp. 966 - 968
DOI: 10.1126/science.255.5047.966
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Articles

New Mechanism of Nonequilibrium Polymer Adsorption

HARRY E. JOHNSON 1 and STEVE GRANICK 1

1 Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL 61801

Nonequilibrium states of surface composition can be extremely long-lived when polymer chains adsorb competitively. In a model system (polymethylmethacrylate adsorbed from CCl4 onto oxidized silicon previously saturated with polystyrene), it is shown that a weakly adsorbing polymer was sterically pinned to a surface by a more strongly adsorbing polymer. The dynamical evolution of the surface composition was strongly nonexponential in time and non-Arrhenius in temperature; the phenomenology is analogous to bulk glasses. This interpretation offers a new mechanism to explain why weakly adsorbing chains may bind to surfaces, as well as a direction in which to look for a method to release them.

Submitted on October 22, 1991
Accepted on January 6, 1992


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