| Abstract: | The spherulitic growth data that exist in the literature for a wide diversity of polymers have been analyzed according to various possible nucleation mechanisms. It is demonstrated that, if allowed a reasonable choice for the equilibrium melting temperature, no unbiased selection of a unique nucleation process can be made. Moreover, a set of universal parameters exists for each of the allowable nucleation processes which enables the data to be represented by a single straight line which encompasses all the polymers. The only quantities specific to a given polymer are the equilibrium melting temperature and the activation energy for transport. The magnitude of the latter quantity is shown to be dependent on the glass temperature of the polymer. |
