Molecular mechanism of solvent-induced crystallization of syndiotactic polystyrene glass. 1. Time-resolved measurements of infrared/Raman spectra andX-ray diffraction

Time-resolved measurements of FT-IR and Raman spectra and X-ray diffraction have been performed to trace the structural changes in the solvent-induced crystallization of syndiotactic polystyrene glass sample. After the exposu re of the glassy sample into the atmosphere of such organic solvent as tolu ene, benzene, or chloroform, the IR and Raman bands characteristic of the r egular helical conformation of (T(2)G(2))(2) type were found to increase th e intensities with time. Some time delay was found for the appearance of th e bands with different critical sequence lengths, leading to the concrete d escription of the growth of regular helical chain from the random coil. The X-ray scattering intensity began to increase largely at the timing of the appearance of the IR and Raman bands of long helical sequences, indicating that the crystal lattice starts to be formed at the timing when the long se gments of regular helical form are gathered together. The rate of this crys tallization process depends on the kind of the used solvent. The factors go verning this difference have been discussed.