Outer layer material having entanglement of hydrophobic polymer hostblended with a maleated hydrophobic polymer co-host, and hydrophilic polymer guest

Abstract

An outer layer material having an entanglement comprising an intermingling of cloaked hydrophilic guest and a hydrophobic polymer host, wherein molecules of the guest have been crosslinked with each other. Under certain circumstances, using complexes of the guest may be desirable or even necessary. Prior to intermingling with the guest, a host blend may be produced to include a physical blend of a hydrophobic polymer host and a maleated hydrophobic co-host (preferably, an anhydride functionalized hydrophobic polymer, whereby the polymer so functionalized, is the same as that selected for the host). The intermingling of the guest and host, or host-co-host blend, includes a physical tangling, whether it also comprises crosslinking by primary bonding (e.g., chemical/covalent bonding) there-between. Also a method of producing an outer layer material having such an entanglement, including the steps of: temporarily cloaking at least a portion of the hydrophilic groups of the guest; intermingling at least a portion of the cloaked groups with a porous polymeric structure by diffusing the guest with cloaked groups into at least a portion of the structure's pores; within the pores, crosslinking at least a portion of the molecules of the guest with the guest; and removing the cloaking. Cloaking may be performed by silylation or acylation. Intermingling may be performed by producing a mixture of guest and host, or host blend, (whether in solution, powdered, granular, etc., form); next, a crosslinking of the guest with itself is performed; then, the mixture is molded into the outer layer with or without additional crosslinking of the host to the host.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.