Analysis of Low Molecular Weight Homologues of Fiber‐Forming Polycondensates

Oligomers belong to the gray area between low molecular weight chemistry and macromolecular chemistry. Although they represent an undesirable “natural impurity” in fiber‐forming polycondensates, they serve as useful model compounds for the corresponding polymers in fundamental research. Whereas for many years new classes of oligomers were being made preparatively accessible and the isolation of higher oligomers in pure form was being pursued, at the present time the emphasis is on analysis. By a combination of classical chemical and instrumental methods of analysis from polymer and organic chemistry, the identification of oligomers of unknown structure, the analytical control of their synthesis and the determination of their content in technical polymers has meanwhile become a routine task.