Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 February 2011
We have studied star-branched polymers in solution under various labelling and contrast matching conditions by small angle neutron scattering and neutron spin echo spectroscopy. We have investigated the relation between the static and dynamic partial structure factors of the variously labeled star polymers. The system of interest is a set of solutions containing 12-arm star branched polyisoprene of arm-molecular weight of 8000, and two polystyrene 12-arm stars, one fully labelled, the other with one arm labelled. The polyisoprene star polymer arms consisted of diblock copolymers, half-deuterated, and half-protonated. Measurements were performed on a center-deuterated star in a contrasted matching deuterated solvent (shell contrast), and on a reverse labelled star with core contrast. We have also studied a solution with the solvent matched the average star scattering length density and solutions containing identical stars with protonated homopolymers. It is found that in the frame-work of the random phase approximations, the initial relaxation rate of the partial dynamic structure factors can be quantitatively accounted for by a function of the eigenmodes of the mobility matrix weighted by an appropriate combinations of the various partial static structure factors.