From Architectures to Cutting-Edge Properties, the Blooming World of Hydrophobically Modified Ethoxylated Urethanes (HEURs)

Baptiste Quienne (1) , Julien Pinaud (1) , Jean-Jacques Robin (1) , Sylvain Caillol (1)

1 ICGM - Institut Charles Gerhardt Montpellier - Institut de Chimie Moléculaire et des Matériaux de Montpellier

Hydrophobically modified ethoxylated urethanes (HEURs) are associative polymers that, compare to others, are far less sensitive to solution parameters, especially pH and ionic strength. Therefore, they are widely used as rheology modifiers in many different waterborne systems such as inks, coatings, emulsions, etc. In solutions, HEURs form transient networks through molecular associations between their hydrophobic groups. The transient network formation and its characteristics are responsible for the rheological properties and depend on the HEUR chains architecture. Many parameters such as molecular weight, size and nature of hydrophobic groups, polymer concentration, etc must be controlled to tune the several physicochemical properties of HEUR solutions. This article aims to give an overview of the HEUR studies reported in the literature in order to highlight the structure/rheological properties relationship. The article also draws attention to new trends in HEURs with innovative architectures and stimuli-responsive properties.

Mots clés: Hydrophobically modified Ethoxylated Urethanes; Associative polymers; Telechelic polymers; Thickeners; Thickening performance; Rheology

Domaines: Polymères

Baptiste Quienne, Julien Pinaud, Jean-Jacques Robin, Sylvain Caillol. From Architectures to Cutting-Edge Properties, the Blooming World of Hydrophobically Modified Ethoxylated Urethanes (HEURs). Macromolecules, 2020, 53 (16), pp.6754-6766. ⟨10.1021/acs.macromol.0c01353⟩. ⟨hal-02924196⟩