Acrylic fibers processing with ionic liquid as solvent

Ionic liquid, 1‐butyl‐3‐methylimidazolium chloride ([BMIM]Cl), was used as solvent for the polymerization of acrylonitrile (AN) and the resulting polymer solution was directly applied for spinning to produce polyacrylonitrile (PAN) fiber for the first time. Acrylic polymers with high content of AN, large molecular weight, and low polydispersity index (PDI) were prepared. The PAN macromolecules have little degradation during dissolution of PAN in [BMIM]Cl, which is completely different from the dissolution of biopolymers such as cellulose in ionic liquids. The PAN fiber with round profile and good mechanical properties was successfully spun from the PAN/[BMIM]Cl solution using dry–jet wet spinning technology. It suggests that an environmental friendly process for the acrylic fiber would be developed and the high performance PAN fiber would be obtained when the spinning conditions are optimized further. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.