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a) b - École Polytechnique de Montréal

a) b - École Polytechnique de Montréal

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After a theoretical <strong>de</strong>termination of the or<strong>de</strong>r of all phases, controlling the composition of<br />

phases allows us to generate novel morphologies such as onion morphology and multi-percolated<br />

structures. SEM micrographs confirm onion morphology for a quaternary HDPE/PS/PMMA/<br />

PVDF blend with a matrix of HDPE and PVDF droplets encapsulated by first-shell PMMA<br />

encapsulated by second-shell PS. Changing the composition of phases, controls the evolution of<br />

the morphology from an onion structure to a multi-percolated one. It illustrates that in a multipercolated<br />

structure, all phases are fully interconnected and interpenetrated. In or<strong>de</strong>r to<br />

quantitatively find the precise region of multi-percolation, solvent extraction followed by a<br />

gravimetric measurement was used to obtain the percent continuity of each phase. Addition of<br />

PANI to highly continuous quaternary blend of HDPE/PS/PMMA/PVDF <strong>de</strong>monstrates a<br />

quadruple-percolated morphology with the or<strong>de</strong>r of phases as HDPE/PS/PMMA/PVDF/PANI.<br />

As PANI situates as the inner phase, even at low concentration it is forced to spread between<br />

other percolated phases.<br />

In another part of the first paper, the effect of the addition of PS-co-PMMA to quinary<br />

HDPE/PS/PMMA/PVDF/PANI blend with a quadruple-percolated structure is studied. Addition<br />

of a compatibilizing agent of two adjacent phases (PS and PMMA) <strong>de</strong>monstrates phase reduction<br />

of PS and PMMA in the blend. Since all phases are assembled in a hierarchically or<strong>de</strong>red<br />

manner, reduction of the phase size of two layers forces the other assembled layers to <strong>de</strong>crease in<br />

size. The first paper evaluates the effect of the number of the phases in a multi-percolated<br />

structure. Ternary, quaternary, quinary, and 6-component blends containing 5% PANI are<br />

prepared. The results indicate that increasing the number of components reduces the conductivity<br />

percolation threshold of all phases including PANI due to geometrical restriction of the phases.<br />

In or<strong>de</strong>r to spread the PANI, at least four components in the multi-percolated structure are<br />

required. Addition of a further number of phases increases conductivity correspon<strong>de</strong>nt to<br />

continuity of PANI only slightly.<br />

In the second paper, through <strong>de</strong>velopment of multi-percolated morphology associated with a<br />

layer-by-layer (LbL) approach, a novel 3D porous polymeric conducting <strong>de</strong>vice (PPCD) is<br />

generated. This technique allows for the percolation threshold concentration of polyaniline<br />

conductive polymer (PANI) to be reduced to values as low as 0.19%. A fully interconnected<br />

porous HDPE substrate with ultra low surface area is prepared by generating double- and triplepercolated<br />

systems followed by annealing and selective solvent extraction of phases. As<br />

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