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Polymers by initiated Chemical Vapor Deposition - From Drug Coatings to Polymer Electrolyte Membranes From abundant biopolymers like cellulose to synthetic anti-adhesive coatings of polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE), a tremendous variety of chemistries and a wide range of properties are accessible with polymeric materials, making them ubiquitous in everyday life. Synthetic polymers with tailored properties through careful monomer selection and/or combination are particularly interesting for practical applications. However, synthesizing materials with multiple, adversative functionalities poses severe technical difficulties as a common solvent, required for standard solution polymerization, is often absent. This limitation is overcome by the novel, solvent-free initiated chemical vapor deposition (iCVD) technique, which allows for conformal coatings with tailored properties even on delicate substrates. In this work, several iCVD polymers and their potential applications are studied. For instance, p-HEMA films are evaluated as protective encapsulation of the pharmaceutical clotrimazole and PFDA/MAA copolymers are synthesized for potential use as ion-conductive membranes . The polymers are characterized regarding their chemical composition, swellability, structure and thermal stability by infrared spectroscopy, ellipsometry and X-ray diffraction, respectively. The results show, for example, how polymeric encapsulation can delay crystallization in amorphous drug films or how temperature influences the molecular packing and chemistry of PFDA/MAA membranes. |