Ab initio calculation of the Young's modulus of α‐polyamides

In earlier works the supermolecule model has been applied to the calculation of the Young's modulus of crystalline polyethylene and polyamide‐6. In the supermolecule model a crystalline polymer is represented as a single finite chain divided into a head, body, and tail part. The body contains a number of monomer units and is representative for a polymer chain. In this article, this model has been used to study the geometric properties and the elastic moduli of the α form of other polyamides: polyamide‐2 (or polyglycine), polyamide‐3, polyamide‐4, polyamide‐11, and polyamide‐6,6. All calculations have been performed with a linearly constrained body. The results have been compared to other theoretical and experimental results if available. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.; DOI 10.1002/qua.2002;10121