The UV polymerisation temperature dependence of polymer-dispersed liquid crystals based on epoxies/acrylates hybrid polymer matrix components

Hybrid polymers, which form a combination of monomers with different reactive groups and curing mechanisms, synergistically combine the properties of the two constituent homopolymers. In this paper, polymer-dispersed liquid crystal (PDLC) films using epoxies / acrylates as hybrid polymer matrix components were prepared. The UV polymerisation temperature dependence of the microstructure and the electro-optical properties of PDLC films based on epoxies / acrylates hybrid polymer matrix had been studied. The electro-optical properties of PDLC films depend strongly on the liquid crystal (LC) domain size and morphology of PDLC films, which could be controlled by the polymerisation rate of the curable monomers and the diffusion rate of the LC molecules during the film preparation process. The polymerisation rate of the curable monomers and the diffusion rate of the LC molecules depend exponentially on the UV polymerisation temperature. Therefore, this research reports an example of methods to prepare PDLC films based on a hybrid polymer matrix and obtain PDLC films which possess good electro-optical properties.

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