NETWORK FORMATION AS A CLUSTER-CLUSTER DIFFUSION-LIMITED AGGREGATION PROCESS, 2 - MODELING THE POLYETHYLENE CROSS-LINKING PROCESS USING MONTE-CARLO AND GRAPH TECHNIQUES

A Monte Carlo simulation of the network formation of polyethylene radi cals has been carried out using the reaction modelling scheme and a gr aph exploration algorithm based on the breadth-first search technique. The results are obtained in a three dimensional cubic continuum space simulation with periodic boundary conditions. Results for three diffe rent polyethylene concentrations are reported. The structural evolutio n of the studied system was followed in terms of number of reactions, molecular mass, aggregate dimension and fractal dimension analysis.