Dense rubbery networks are highly entangled polymer systems, with significant topological restrictions for the mobility of neighbouring chains and crosslinks preventing the reptation constraint release. In a mean field approach, entanglements are treated within the famous reptation approach, since they effectively confine each individual chain in a tube-like geometry. We apply the classical ideas of reptation dynamics to calculate the effective rubber-elastic free energy of anisotropic networks, nematic liquid crystal elastomers, and present the first theory of entanglements for such a material.
Categories: cond-mat.soft cond-mat.stat-mech