Phase transfer catalyst aided radical polymerization of n-butyl acrylate in two-phase system: a kinetic study

The kinetics of radical polymerization of butyl acrylate initiated by potassium peroxydisulphate and cetyltrimethylammonium bromide as phase transfer catalyst (PTC) was carried out under inert and unstirred conditions at constant temperature of 60 ± 2 °C in ethyl acetate–water biphase media. The polymerization reactions were relatively fast in the two-phase systems with phase transfer agent whereas extremely sluggish in the system without PTC. Use of PTC accelerates the reaction effectively if the reactants located in two phase. The effects of rate of polymerization (R p) on various experimental conditions such as different concentrations of monomer, initiator, phase transfer catalyst, temperature, and different ionic strength of the medium were explored. The order with respect to monomer, initiator and phase transfer catalyst was found to be unity. The R p is independent of ionic strength and pH of the medium. However, an increase in the polarity of solvent has slightly increased the R p value. Based on the results obtained, a plausible mechanism has been proposed for the polymerization reaction. The obtained polymer was confirmed by FT-IR analysis.