Abstract
Spontaneous degradation of bottlebrush macromolecules on aqueous substrates was monitored by atomic force microscopy. Scission of C ─ C covalent bonds in the brush backbone occurred due to steric repulsion between the adsorbed side chains, which generated bond tension on the order of several nano-Newtons. Unlike conventional chemical reactions, the rate of bond scission was shown to decrease with temperature. This apparent anti-Arrhenius behavior was caused by a decrease in the surface energy of the underlying substrate upon heating, which results in a corresponding decrease of bond tension in the adsorbed macromolecules. Even though the tension dropped minimally from 2.16 to 1.89 nN, this was sufficient to overpower the increase in the thermal energy (k(B)T) in the Arrhenius equation. The rate constant of the bond-scission reaction was measured as a function of temperature and surface energy. Fitting the experimental data by a perturbed Morse potential V = V(0)(1 - e(-βx))(2) - fx, we determined the depth and width of the potential to be V(0) = 141 ± 19 kJ/mol and β(-1) = 0.18 ± 0.03 Å, respectively. Whereas the V(0) value is in reasonable agreement with the activation energy E(a) = 80-220 kJ/mol of mechanical and thermal degradation of organic polymers, it is significantly lower than the dissociation energy of a C ─ C bond D(e) = 350 kJ/mol. Moreover, the force constant K(x) = 2β(2)V(0) = 1.45 ± 0.36 kN/m of a strained bottlebrush along its backbone is markedly larger than the force constant of a C ─ C bond K(l) = 0.44 kN/m, which is attributed to additional stiffness due to deformation of the side chains.