Chair for Materials Science and Engineering
Institute for Materials • Faculty of Mechanical Engineering
Polymers
Since the founding of the Chair of Materials Science and Engineering, scientists have been working on polymer materials. The research, today performed in Klaus Neuking’s group, originated in our collaborative research center on shape memory alloys SFB 459, where the functional properties and elementary mechanisms of shape memory alloys and polymers were compared. In our group, we have an instrumented extruder that allows for the production of polymer specimens starting from granulates. Specific moulds were designed and machined so specimens for mechanical (tensile testing, mechanical spectroscopy), thermal (DSC assessment) and chemical (uptake of small molecules) experiments could be produced. As a model material, we have developed expertise in working with a polyurethane of type Estane ETE 75DT3. This material can be programed for the one-way effect. Our polymer group was able to obtain funding through the DFG priority program SPP 1713 (Strong coupling of thermo-chemical and thermo-mechanical states in applied materials). Here we investigate how the uptake of small molecules affects the one-way effect. At the beginning, this project was submitted as a joint research project with researchers from polymer physics and polymer mechanics. Today, we closely collaborate with Prof. Fatollah Varnik’s group from ICAMS.
