EFFECT OF CHEMICAL STRUCTURE OF POLYCARBONATES ON ENTANGLEMENT SPACING

The master curves of a series of aliphatic polycarbonates (APCs) with different lengths of methylene segments in the repeat unit were obtained by dynamic rheological measurements. The plateau modulus and entanglement molecular weight were determined and cross-checked by different methods. Though having distinct difference in chemical structure of repeat units, both APCs and bisphenol-A polycarbonates have the similar entanglement weight and entanglement spacing. On the other side, the plateau modulus decreases with increasing the length of the side group of aliphatic polycarbonates with different side-chain lengths in the literature. The packing length model can explain the relationship between chain structure and entanglements.