An. Nikitin, POSTPOLYMERIZATION EFFECT ON MOLECULAR-WEIGHT DISTRIBUTION GENERATED BY PULSED-LASER RADICAL POLYMERIZATION, Macromolecular theory and simulations, 5(5), 1996, pp. 957-967
The postpolymerization effect on molecular weight distributions (MWDs)
and on the Pulsed Laser Polymerization (PLP) technique for evaluation
of kinetic constants is investigated. General expressions for moments
are derived for a polymerization scheme that contains the reactions o
f chain initiation, propagation, and termination by recombination or d
isproportionation, under polymerization initiation by an arbitrary seq
uence of radiation pulses. The results of calculation of MWDs and of t
he weight-average degree of polymerization <((P)over bar (W))> for met
hyl methacrylate are presented. It is shown that the <(P)over bar (W)>
value strongly depends on postpolymerization. A new method for determ
ining the rate constants of chain propagation and chain termination fr
om a single experiment by polymerization with packets of laser pulses
is presented.