Glass Fibers with Oriented Chain Molecules

The concept of glass as a polymer of silicon, phosphorus, or other glassforming atoms connected by oxygen atoms suggests that fibers with oriented linear chains may be prepared. Previous attempts to demonstrate such orientation have failed, however, with glasses of the usual compositions. The composition in which linear chains seem most likely to occur is that of the “meta” salts in which each glassformer is bound, on the average, to two others through oxygen atoms. Under drawing conditions indicated by the theory of viscoelastic properties of high polymers, fibers of sodium metaphosphate glass have been prepared that show birefringence and give X‐ray diffraction patterns similar to those of organic fibers with oriented chain molecules. Under analogous treatment sodium metasilicate failed to give such effects.