A. Stopin, A. Rossignon, M. Keshavarz, Y. Ishida, P. C. M. Christianen, D. Bonifazi,
Chem. Mater., 2016, 28, pp 6985–6994
DOI: 10.1021/acs.chemmater.6b02687
Abstract
Through application of an external magnetic field upon jellification of PHBV polymer in different solvents, an anisotropic organogel is obtained. This material presents two alignment steps in an external magnetic field, in the liquid phase and during the jellification, both phenomena measured by magnetic field induced linear birefringence. Remarkably, the organogel developed in this study presents a strong level of birefringence, 80 % of its maximum, in an external magnetic field as low as 2 T resulting from the magnetic alignment of the fibres of the material. This anisotropic material shows changes of absorbance upon rotation of a polarizer switching from “transparent” to “opaque”. In addition, its suprastructure does not influence the luminescent properties of encapsulated chromophores, allowing the formation of coloured anisotropic materials.
