Polymers inevitably entangle, and do not disentangle in a crosslinked network. This talk describes synthesis and properties of tanglemer, a polymer network in which entanglements greatly outnumber crosslinks. We discover that crosslinks and entanglements act differently when a crack grows in the network: crosslinks concentrate stress, but entanglements deconcentrate stress. The deconcentration of stress leads to outstanding mechanical behavior. In particular, a tanglemer reinforced with rigid particles amplifies fatigue threshold by an order of magnitude. The tanglemer illustrates how network topology affects mechanical behavior.
Zhigang Suo is the Allen E. and Marilyn M. Puckett Professor of Mechanics and Materials at Harvard University. He earned a bachelor degree at Xian Jiaotong University in 1985, and a PhD at Harvard University in 1989. Suo joined the faculty of the University of California at Santa Barbara in 1989, Princeton University in 1997, and Harvard University in 2003.
