MOLECULAR-WEIGHT DEFINED IN SOL-GEL ANALYSIS AND ITS APPLICATION TO EVALUATE BRANCHING

It is considered that many ''linear'' polymers are actually branched; however, it is difficult to show this with ordinary methods for an arbitrarily chosen polymer. Branching can be regarded as premature crosslinking below the gel point. Attention is then paid to the well-established Charlesby-Pinner Equation used for sol-gel analysis in crosslinking studies. It contains the number average degree of polymerization before crosslinking as a parameter. The molecular parameter is considered here to be that of the virtual linear polymer which would be obtained by unlinking any branch points contained in the polymer. Evidence is shown to support this. It is then possible to estimate the total number of linear components on an average molecule of a branched polymer by taking the ratio of the number average molecular weight measured by two methods, i.e., sol-gel analysis and an ordinary method like GPC. Further information about the branching structure can be obtained by additional measurements of effective crosslink density for a series of polymers obtained from similar polymerization processes.