The course of emulsion polymerization may be considered as involving three intervals: Interval I, where particle formation takes place. The end of this interval is not dependent upon the degree of conversion, but on the total amount of polymer formed. With usual recipes, it ends at about 1-5% conversion. Interval II lasts from the end of Interval I until monomer disappears as a separate phase. In this interval, the particle number is usually found to be constant, the particle volume increases proportional to conversion, the monomer concentration in the particles is approximately constant, and therefore the termination is also constant within the particles. Interval III starts when the monomer disappears as a separate phase. The transition from Intervals II to III is determined by the degree of conversion and differs for different monomers. In cases where the solubility of monomer in the water phase is low, the monomer present in the aqueous phase may usually be neglected compared to the monomer present in the polymer particles. This will usually hold with most monomers at ordinary conditions, where the amount of polymer per unit of water is relatively high, and when the concentration of monomer in the particles is much higher than in the aqueous phase. In this case, the particle volume during Interval III will decrease slightly due to the contraction by polymerization. The concentration of monomer in the particles generally decreases during Interval III, which leads to an increased viscosity within the particles and thereby also to a decrease in the value of the termination constant. The present paper deals chiefly with the kinetics of emulsion polymerization in the three intervals and the application of kinetics to the study of the mechanism. Several review articles on emulsion polymerization have recently appeared in the literature. The reason for presenting a new review article is that a vast number of papers on emulsion polymerization have recently been published, which have broadened the theoretical and experimental knowledge of the process. Several experimental and theoretical studies on the mechanisms of particle formation have appeared. New theories for particle formation outside the micelles have appeared. Also the relative effectiveness of micelles and particles in capturing radicals from the aqueous phase has been discussed in several papers.

This paper is the first in a series intended to clarify the particle nucleation mechanisms in emulsion polymerization. The theory for particle nucleation by precipitation of oligomeric radicals from the water phase is discussed and a model based on the diffusion, propagation and termination steps is presented. The physical factors that influence the capture rate of oligomers in particles are discussed, and qualitative expressions for the electrostatic repulsion and reversible diffusion are derived. These factors are shown to be able to explain the relatively slow absorption rate of oligomers in particles and micelles. A kinetic model for simultaneous particle nucleation and limited flocculation is presented. Numerical integration of this model shows that the particle number goes through a maximum and that simultaneous nucleation and flocculation of primary particles may take place after Interval I in an emulsion polymerization is finished.

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A novel method for preparation of stable emulsions of slightly water soluble compounds is described. The method implies that the slightly water soluble compound diffuses through water and becomes absorbed into polymer particles which in a previous step have been brought to absorb a water insoluble, relatively low molecular weight compound. By this two step swelling process the polymer particles can be brought to absorb more than 100 times their own volume of the low molecular weight compounds to form stable o/w emulsions of the latter, with high oil content, and with a droplet size and size distribution which is completely determined by the size of the polymer particles in the latex applied initially. Monodisperse emulsions with large droplet size could easily be prepared. When the slightly water soluble compound added in the second step is a vinyl monomer which may subsequently be polymerized, the method represents a seed technique which is especially favourable for preparation of latexes with large particles size, including monodisperse latexes, with high solid content.

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Polymer-supported chiral organocatalysts, as well as most other forms of immobilized catalysts, are traditionally prepared by a postmodification approach where modified catalyst precursors are anchored onto prefabricated polymer beads. Herein, we report an alternative and more scalable approach where polymer-supported chiral enamine and iminium organocatalysts are prepared in a bottom-up fashion where methacrylic functional monomers are prepared in an entirely nonchromatographic manner and subsequently copolymerized with suitable comonomers to give cross-linked polymer beads. All syntheses have been conducted on multigram scale for all intermediates and finished polymer products, and the catalysts have proven successful in reactions taking place in solvents spanning a wide range of solvent polarity. While polymer-supported proline and prolineamides generally demonstrated excellent results and recycling robustness in asymmetric aldol reactions of ketones and benzaldehydes, the simplest type of Jørgensen/Hayashi diarylprolinol TMS-ether showed excellent selectivity, but rather sluggish reactivity in the Enders-type asymmetric cascade. The polymer-supported version of the first-generation MacMillan imidazolidinone had a pattern of reactivity very similar to that of the monomeric catalyst, but is too unstable to allow recycling.