From Dendrimers to Dendronized Polymers and Forests: Scaling Theory and its Limitations

Abstract

A unified Flory-type theory of dendron brushes, dendrimers, dendronized polymers, and forests yields scaling rules, state diagrams and information on the collapse transition. The theory also describes the corresponding brushes of linear chains: stars, bottle brushes, and planar brushes. It thus permits a detailed discussion of various tuning parameters and their effects for the different brush types. The discussion addresses the effects of solvent quality, grafting density, the persistence length, and branching functionality. The theory is formulated for the case of “identical monomers” assuming that spacer monomers, junctions, and ends are identical in shape and interactions.