Mechanically interlocked polymer properties.

I'm a chemist with a lousy background in real materials science. I'm working on a proposal write up for making true polycatenanes; I'm wondering if anyone knows of, how to predict, or where to find various physical properties taking into account the effect(s) of mechanical interlocks.

Basically I have a method for making a polymer composed of molecular rings (in the area of 5 nanometres wide) that form a chain of interlocking rings and minimal non-steric interaction between said rings. Basically I'm looking at the smallest mechanical chains in known existance.

So what (if any) effect would the vastily increased local mobility, topological interlocks, and freedom of rotation for individual monomers have on the stress-strain curves and anything else that would be novel (i.e. vastly abnormal glass transitions, vastly abnormal viscosity, etc.)?

Rough guesses are welcomed, articles or equations desired, and any hint of serious computational modling cherished.

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but how do you process it?

I don't have it, I just know how to make it and am in the processing of begging ... err writing proposals to get funding to make it. I think I can make it in batch, and have a few vague ideas about how to do it industrially (but again that ain't my job). This also isn't chain mail so much as a simple linear chain (though I suppose you could follow the basic technique I have in mind to make polycatenic dendrimers without too many hassles).

The size is pretty much whatever you want it to be I could conceivably bring the ring diametre down a bit or greatly increase it. The basic synthesis is independant of ring size.

If it is ionic or hydrogen bonded, it may be like welding bedsprings together - no bounce. Not by design, if everything works as hoped the interring bonds should be coming from weak dipoles (mainly aromatic nitrogen and ketones). It would be trivial to introduce nonuniform ionic character.

Ring size is pretty much whatever hassle you want to go through during synthesis. My motto has always been Keep It Simple, Stupid so I have a fairly versitile method in mind, but don't want to push the limits on the first shot.

Silicone might be doable, but that would be a major headache.

So you materials science guys don't have methods to predict these properties from first principles? I would have thought the properties of polyethylene would have been relatively simple to predict (at least it would be one of the easier polymers to make predictions about).

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