Polydimethylsiloxane Polymerized Emulsions for Acoustic Materials Prepared Using Reactive Triblock Copolymer Surfactants

Porous polymers have interesting acoustic properties including wave dampening and acoustic impedance matching and may be used in numerous acoustic applications, e.g., waveguiding or acoustic cloaking. These materials can be prepared by the inclusion of gas-filled voids, or pores, within an elastic polymer network; therefore, porous polymers that have controlled porosity values and a wide range of possible mechanical properties are needed, as these are key factors that impact the sound-dampening properties. Here, the synthesis of acoustic materials with varying porosities and mechanical properties that could be controlled independent of the pore morphology using emulsion-templated polymerizations is described. Polydimethylsiloxane-based ABA triblock copolymer surfactants were prepared using reversible addition–fragmentation chain transfer polymerizations to control the emulsion template and act as an additional cross-linker in the polymerization. Acoustic materials prepared with reactive surfactants possessed a storage modulus of ∼300 kPa at a total porosity of 71% compared to materials prepared using analogous nonreactive surfactants that possessed storage modulus values of ∼150 kPa at similar porosities. These materials display very low longitudinal sound speeds of ∼35 m/s at ultrasonic frequencies, making them excellent candidates in the preparation of acoustic devices such as metasurfaces or lenses.