The Polymer Society of Korea

Abstract

Bicontinuous cubic phases such as Im3m and Pn3m provide highly ordered three-dimensionally interconnected networks with high surface areas and loading capacity, yet their formation in block copolymer systems remains challenging due to narrow stability windows and kinetic trapping. Here, we report a self-assembly strategy to generate polymer cubosomes and hexosomes from poly(lactic acid)-block-polystyrene (PLA-b-PS) in acetonitrile using a blending-based curvature control approach. By combining chromatographic fractionation of PLA-b-PS for morphology screening with controlled blending of PLA-rich block copolymers for curvature tuning, the effective packing parameter and interfacial curvature of the self-assembled bilayer networks are tuned. This enables access to bicontinuous cubic and hexagonal nanostructures from a single polymer platform. The resulting hydrophobic polymer cubosomes are expected to serve as templates for functional porous materials.