An example of polymer reactivity affected by the presence of another polymer

Abstract

AbstractThe acid hydrolysis of the cellulose portion of cellulose‐g‐poly(vinyl acetate‐co‐methyl acrylate) was carried out. The effect of the synthetic polymer in the reaction medium on the reactivity of cellulose in its acid depolymerization was studied. It could be shown that this effect is the same whether the synthetic polymer is covalently linked to cellulose or not and it was found that the hydrolysis time needed to degrade the cellulosic part of the graft copolymer is strongly dependent on the composition of the reaction mixture. This work showed that only a restricted range of graft copolymer compositions can be hydrolyzed in the shortest reaction time here established (14h). In order to hydrolyze graft copolymer samples with different compositions to those of the cited range, in the same hydrolysis time of 14h, two methods are suggested: (a) elimination of an adequate portion of cellulose from the graft copolymer and (b) addition of an appropriate amount of synthetic polymer to the graft copolymer sample. The second method is not useful from the point of view of polymer characterization. A molecular description of the reaction medium on the basis of the system components is attempted.