Studies on the radical polymerization of vinyl acetate in benzene,chlorobenzene and ethyl acetate by 1H NMR spectroscopy

Summary Polymerizations of vinyl acetate were carried out with AIBN in benzene, chlorobenzene and ethyl acetate, and the resultant polymers were analyzed for terminal group by using ¹H NMR technique. The results revealed that a part of the polymer molecules prepared in aromatic solvent contained one solvent fragment at the chain end, indicating the incorporation of aromatic molecule through the chain transfer reaction and not by the copolymerization. It was found that there existed at least 0.7 branching per a molecule in the polymer prepared in ethyl acetate, whereas almost no branching in the polymer prepared in aromatic solvents.