This course provides problems related to the contents of Statistical Mechanics for the Polymers and Polymer Physics III (Rheology) in order to allow students to get good understanding of these courses contents and practical applications.
Students will have the chance to tackle practical problems by applying knowledge acquired through these courses.
At the end of this course, students will be able to:
1) Explain several topics related to polymer science.
2) Have an understanding of polymer and based on this, solve basic problems related to polymer science.
3) Read documents related to polymer science in English.
reaction velocity, partition function, viscoelasticity, rubber elasticity, time-temperature superposition principle, master curve
✔ Specialist skills | ✔ Intercultural skills | Communication skills | Critical thinking skills | ✔ Practical and/or problem-solving skills |
At the beginning of each class, students are given a quiz in the subject treated in the previous class. Towards the end of class, the solutions to exercise problems assigned on that day's class are reviewed. Students must familiarize themselves with topics described in the required learning section before coming to class.
Course schedule | Required learning | |
---|---|---|
Class 1 | Chemical kinetics | Calculate order of reaction, velocity constant, and activation energy for chemical reactions. |
Class 2 | Statistical thermodynamics | Derive partition function and calculate internal energy and entropy. |
Class 3 | Polymer Conformations | Calculate the size of a polymer chain (end-to-end distance and radius of gyration). |
Class 4 | Linear vsicoelsticity | Calculate stress, strain, elastic modulus, and viscosity for viscelastic materials |
Class 5 | Rubber elasticity (I) | Calculate the elasticity of a polymer chain and the elasticity of ideal networks. Derive the relationship between shear modulus and the molecular weight between cross-links. |
Class 6 | Rubber elasticity (II) | Explain the rubber elasticity and the thermal phenomena of rubbers in thermodynamics. |
Class 7 | Time-temperature superposition principle | Derive the Williams-Landel-Ferry (WLF) equation based on the free-volume theory. Estimate the viscosities of polymer melts at different temperatures using the WLF equation. |
Class 8 | Relaxation processes in viscoelastic behaviors | Estimate the molecular weight and viscosity of polymers from the master curves of viscoelastic properties. |
Course materials are provided during class.
Atkins' Physical Chemistry 8th ed. Vol. 2, Tokyo Kagaku Dojin, ISBN978-4-8079-0696-3 (Jaanese)
The Society of Polymer Science, Japan, ed., Kiso Kobunshi Kagaku (Intoduction to Polymer Science), 2006, Tokyo: Tokyo Kagaku Dojin, ISBN :978-4-8079-0635-2 (Japanese)
Students' course scores are based on the results of exercise problems about the previous class held at the biggining of each class.
Students must be attending Polymer Physics III in the same quarter or have successfully completed it or hae equivalent knowledge, and have successfully completed the following courses or have equivalent knowledge: Statistical Mechanics for the Polymers and Polymer Physics I.