Design and Synthesis of Poly(butyl acrylate) Networks through RAFT Polymerization with Crosslinking for Controlled-Release Applications

An effective approach is presented for designing and tailoring diffusion-controlled systems for targeted release rate profiles. The diffusion-controlled system consists of PBA networks with precisely controlled crosslink densities via RAFT copolymerization of BA with ethylene glycol dimethacrylate, which gives a desired diffusivity. One-dimensional releases in the crosslinked PBA matrix (CPM) slabs are evaluated with a hydrophobic dye. Fick's second law is used to model the transient mass transfers in the CPMs with a mixed Newton-Tikhonov regularization method for determination of their diffusion coefficients. A two-layer CPM (CPM-2) with controlled crosslink densities is constructed. The dye release results from the CPM-2 agreed well with theoretical predictions.