Free Radical Copolymerization of Acrylamide and Linalool with Functional Group as a Pendant

Linalool (LIN) and acrylamide (AM) have been copolymerized by benzoyl peroxide (BPO) in xylene at 75°C for 40 min. The system follows the ideal kinetics with bimolecular termination and results in the formation of nearly alternating copolymer as evidenced from the reactivity ratios, r 1 (AM) = 0.3 and r 2 (LIN) = 0.05, which have been calculated by the Kelen-Tudos method. The overall activation energy of copolymerization is 40 kJ mol −1 . The Fourier transform infrared spectrum of the copolymer shows the presence of the band at 3395 cm −1 due to the alcoholic group of LIN and at 1453 cm −1 due to the amide group of AM. The 1 HNMR spectrum shows peaks at 7.0-7.7δ due to the alcoholic group of LIN and at 6.3-7.0δ due to the amide group of AM. The Alfrey-Price Q- e parameters for LIN have been calculated as Q 2 = 0:274 and e 2 = −0.749. The mechanism of copolymerization has been elucidated. In this paper we also report on the measurement of Mark-Houwink constants in tetrahydrofuran (THF) at 25°C by means of gel permeation chromatography (GPC) as α = 0.50 and K = 7.5 × 10 −4 dl g −1 . The thermal decompositions of the copolymer are established with the help of the thermal gravimetric analysis technique.