ORDERING PROCESSES IN THE AROMATIC POLYESTERS.

In this paper a brief perspective is provided of the early work on the polymers of p-hydroxybenzoic acid (PHBA) and an effort made to describe the key events in the process of discovery and development of this class of materials. More recent work is then presented on a number of novel ordering processes in these systems including: thermally induced topotactic transitions, molecular and supermolecular ordering during polymerization, processing of the thermotropic state, and ordering in the thermotropic state.