The effect of reaction media on the upper critical solution temperature ofthe acrylamide and acrylonitrile copolymers

In the present study, the acrylamide and acrylonitrile copolymers (poly(AAm-co-AN)) weresynthesized by free radical polymerization method in dimethyl sulfoxide solvent. The effect ofaddition of small amount of deionized water to the reaction medium on copolymer composition andupper critical solution temperature (UCST) was investigated. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy(FTIR) analysis was used to identify the synthesized polymers, and the turbidity of the aqueoussolutions versus temperature was evaluated by ultraviolet-visible spectrometry (UV-Vis). The resultsof FTIR analyses showed that by adding DI water to DMSO solvent, the amount of acrylonitrile inthe copolymer composition decreased significantly. Also, the results of UV-Vis analyses showed thatreducing the amount of acrylonitrile in the copolymer led to a decrease of about ۱۰ ℃ in the UCSTof the copolymer.

کلیدواژه ها:

poly(AAm-co-AN) ، UCST ، solvent effect.