In order to clarify the effect of topological constraint and restriction of entanglement species on the primary nucleation and crystal growth, we observed degree of supercooling ?T dependence of nucleation rate I and growth rate G of cyclic polyethylene (C-PE). We found that I and G follow I=I0exp(-C/?T2) and G=G0exp(-B/?T) where C and B increase with increasing Mw?. This means that the end surface of nucleus becomes to be ordered because of decreasing topological constraint with increasing Mw. On the other hand, I0 of C-PE with Mw=115k is almost the same with of linear polyethylene (L-PE) with Mw=35k and G0 of C-PE is smaller than that of L-PE at the same Mw=44k. This means that C-PE is easy to nucleate due to lack of knot entanglement but is difficult to grow. We speculated that adsorption behavior of the chains on the secondary nucleus is different between C-PE and L-PE.

Primary nucleation and crystal growth of cyclic polyethylene under quiescent state

245th National Meeting (2013)

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