Reaction kinetics in polymer melts

Reaction Kinetics in Polymer Melts

We study the reaction kinetics of end-functionalized polymer chains dispersed in an unreactive polymer melt. Starting from an infinite hierarchy of coupled equations for many-chain correlation functions, a closed equation is derived for the 2nd order rate constant k after postulating simple physical bounds. Our results generalize previous 2-chain treatments (valid in dilute reactants limit) by ...

Non-Markovian polymer reaction kinetics.

Describing the kinetics of polymer reactions, such as the formation of loops and hairpins in nucleic acids or polypeptides, is complicated by the structural dynamics of their chains. Although both intramolecular reactions, such as cyclization, and intermolecular reactions have been studied extensively, both experimentally and theoretically, there is to date no exact explicit analytical treatmen...

Nanoparticle Dynamics in Polymer Melts

Properties of Confined Polymer Melts

Properties of simple models of confined linear polymer chains were studied by means of the Monte Carlo method. Model chains were built of united atoms (statistical segments) and embedded to a simple cubic lattice. Then polymers were put into a slit formed by two parallel impenetrable surfaces. Chain lengths were varied up to 800 segments and the density of the polymer melt was changed up to 0.5...

Crystal Growth and Impingement in Polymer Melts

Crystallization of polymeric materials is a solidification process in strong interaction with heat conduction. Both of the basic mechanisms involved in the solidification from a melt, namely the nucleation and growth of crystals, are strongly influenced by the temperature and its variation. Vice versa, the latent heat is rather large for polymeric materials, so that it causes a considerable cha...