The Reactivity of Cellulose1

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Abstract
The chemical finishing of cotton involves applying to it materials that either react with the cellulose or with one another after they have been adsorbed by the cellulose. For finislies of the first kind it is obviously important to have the cellulose in a reactive condition, but it is no less important for the second kind also, since reactivity and ac cessibility are in general closely correlated. This paper discusses the reasons underlying the great differences of reactivity that can be encountered among samples of cellulose that appear to be identical chemically and differ only in physical form or structure. Moisture absorption studies exemplify these differences and build a theory that goes far to explain them in terms of variability of the availability of the reacting groups in the cellulose molecule. Thus purified cotton is in general in a state of low reactivity and regenerated cellulose in one of high reactivity, while mercerized cotton occupies an intermediate position. This picture is for most reactions satisfactory, but in some it is completely revèrsed, with ordinary cotton having a high reactivity and regenerated cellulose a low, mercerized cotton being again inter mediate. The cause of this is discussed in the light of more recent work.

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