ENHANCED REACTIVITY OF THE EPOXY OLIGOMERS IN ORGANIZED MONOLAYERS ATAIR-WATER-INTERFACE

The behaviors of monolayers of novolac and diglycidyl ether of bisphen ol A type epoxy oligomers on the surface of water were studied. Using a surface balance technique and FT-IR spectroscopy, it was found that the time evolution of surface pressure and surface area of the monolay ers is controlled by the chemical reactions of these oligomers with wa ter and carbon dioxide. The specific reactivity of epoxy oligomers in a one-layer organized system at the air-water interface (in bulk simil ar reactions may proceed only under severe conditions) is enabled by t he increased concentration and the mobility of protons in a thin layer of water adjacent to the monolayer and by, the basicity of the epoxy groups of the oligomers. Surface reactions of epoxy oligomers are show n to be topochemical in nature; the kinetics of these reactions may be described by the Avrami-Erofeev equation. The magnitudes of the param eters of this equation which were determined for the monolayers of eac h of the oligomers lead to the conclusion that, generally, the dynamic s of epoxy oligomer monolayers is controlled by chemical transformatio ns in and rearrangement of the surface layer.