Title: The Narrow Thickness Distribution of Lamellae of Poly(butylene succinate) Formed at Low Melt Supercooling
Abstract: Crystallization of poly(butylene succinate) (PBS) at 100 °C, about 30 K below the equilibrium melting temperature, allowed the preparation of crystals, which were analyzed regarding their zero-entropy-production melting temperature. Irreversible melting occurs in a rather narrow temperature window of only around 8 K, between 101 and 109 °C, revealing a narrow distribution of the thickness of isothermally formed lamellae and a rather low thickening/stabilization factor of less than 1.4. Quasi-isothermal temperature-modulated differential scanning calorimetry suggests significant reversible melting and crystallization during and after crystallization, proving the existence of a large fraction of crystalline phase being at the stability limit at the crystallization temperature. Heating of crystals formed at 100 °C to above their zero-entropy-production melting temperature, followed by isothermal annealing, permitted the analysis of the kinetics of irreversible melting, yielding superheating-dependent rate constants of the order of magnitude of 102 s–1 5–10 K above the zero-entropy-production melting temperature. The advanced analysis of the melting behavior of polymer crystals isothermally grown at low melt supercooling allows one to draw conclusions about their (inherently) low thermodynamic stability.
Publication Year: 2021
Publication Date: 2021-03-24
Language: en
Type: article
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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Cited By Count: 16
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