Effects of polydispersity on critical concentration of polymer solutions

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Abstract
A semiempirical equation is developed to compute the unperturbed parameter from the critical concentration of polymer solutions derived from the viscometric and kinetic data. This equation gives satisfactory results for various vinyl polymers including poly(vinyl chloride), polystyrene and poly(methyl methacrylate) among others that follow the Schulz molecular weight distribution function. It is found that the segments of a Gaussian polymer chain are associated with an equal number of foreign segments near its center of mass, when the polymer solution has attained a uniform segment density at the critical concentration. The effect of molecular weight distribution on the present studies is significantly large that it merits an empirical treatment. Defects of the model is also discussed.