Comparing optical properties of azo compounds based on diblock copolymers

M. F. CAMEZZANA; P.A. OYANGUREN; M.J. GALANTE; I. A. ZUCCHI

Lyon

Simposio; 2nd International Symposium Frontiers in Polymer Science; 2011

We have investigated the growth and decay processes of the optically induced birefringence in azo containing films of polystyrene-b-poly(methyl methacrylate) (PS-b-PMMA). To promote the selective location of azo groups in PMMA domains of PS-b-PMMA, an azo-containing thermoplastic (Azo-TP) was synthesized from the bulk reaction of Disperse Orange 3 (DO3, push-pull) and diglycidyl ether of bisphenol A (DGEBA, DER332) in amine/epoxy ratio equal to 1.  The optical behavior of the resulting films was compared with films obtained dispersing DO3 in (PS-b-PMMA) (Fig. 1).  The high remnat birefringence values (70 %)  make these promising materials for optical information storage.