Theory of Gel Formation
arXiv:0705.4591
Abstract
A theory of drop-wise addition polymerization is developed. Because of the linear growth of the reaction volume V, the system gives rise to a new type of distribution function for cyclic species that can be expressed by the sum of two terms: the conventional distribution term and a extra term due to the dilution effect. The present result is an extension of the conventional homogeneous polymerization that corresponds to a special case without the extra term. Making use of the result we derive the gel point formula for this unique polymerization. The theoretical result is compared with the recent observations.
11 pages, 4 figures, 2 Tables