Abstract
Hydrocarbon-based hydrophobic polymers on water generally form aggregated particles and do not form spread monolayers. Our recent work showed that hydrophobic polysilanes form all ideal monolayer with the assist of liquid crystal molecule on water. Co-spreading of hydrophobic polysilanes and 4'-pentyl-4-cyanobiphenyl (5CB) provides a hybrid monolayer in which the polymer forms a spread monolayer on top of the 5CB monolayer. This pictue can be verified by the behavior of the surface pressure-area isotherm, Brewster angle microscopy, and atomic force microscopy. The hybrid monolayer can be deposited onto solid substrates having both hydrophilic and hydrophobic surfaces. Onto a hydrophobic substrate surface, only PDHS is deposited and 5CB is expelled from the resulting LB film. This method may open a new clue to the study of ultrathin polymer films.
