ABSTRACT
Polymer blends are the simplest polymer mixtures that can result in an enhance ment of the desired properties that are exhibited by the individual components and thus to important applications. Block copolymers, on the other hand, are formed by the covalent bonding of two or more polymers. This combination is nontrivial and requires specialized chemistry, but it can be performed in different ways, re sulting in linear and nonlinear copolymers (star, graft, miktoarm stars, etc.). In all cases, the most significant factor in determining the rich block copolymer phase behavior is the covalent bond that restricts the macrophase separation of chemi cally dissimilar blocks.
