Concentration Effects in Sec for Polymer/Polymer/Solvent Systems

Abstract

A model quantitatively describing the experimental shifts in elution volumes of polymeric solute A in the presence of another polymer B is developed. The concentration-dependent shrinkage of A coils has been evaluated from the intrinsic viscosity displayed by polymer A in the ternary solution formed by itself at c_A concentration + polymer B at c_B concentration + solvent. Resulting concentration effects depend on both polymer concentrations (c_A and c_B), on the intrinsic viscosities of both polymers in the solvent (|η|A and |η|B), on the Huggins' coefficients k_A and k_B, and on the quadratic concentration coefficients in the polynomial expansion of ηsp/c, namely k^′ _A and k^′ _B. Predicted elution volumes are compared with experimental ones for two different types of literature systems: those studying polymer A elution at diverse c_A concentrations in eluents consisting of mixtures of polymer B + solvent and those in which polymer A + polymer B mixtures are injected at once in the pure solvent used as eluent. In order to eliminate experimental uncertainties about k_i and k^′ _i (i=A, B) values, applied k^′ _i values were those obtained from the empirical correlation k^′ _i + 0.122 = k_i ² whereas k_i ones were obtained from Imai's equation.