Grafting acrylonitrile on kenaf fibers using ceric ion-p-xylene redox pair

Graft copolymerization of acrylic acid onto methylcellulose by potassium permanganate‐p‐xylene redox pair

“…The graft copolymerization of acrylic acid onto MC by a potassium permanganate–XY redox pair in the concentration range from 0.93 × 10 −3 to 9.33 × 10 −3 M XY demonstrates these features, as can be seen in Figure 1. This corroborates an earlier report on the ability of the redox pair to initiate a graft copolymerization reaction 11. The proposed reaction scheme for the process is as follows: Initiation: Propagation: Termination: Chain Transfer: Where MC, XY, XY • and M represent methylcellulose, p‐xylene, the p‐xylyl radical and the monomer respectively.…”

“…These features were associated with two kinetically controlled reactions, arising from two distinct initiating species, namely, a p-xylyl radical and a diradical. [11][12] Similar features have been observed for the potassium permanganate-p-xylene redox pair as an initiator of the graft copolymerization of acrylonitrile onto kenaf fiber, 11 although no detailed studies were conducted on the overall grafting characteristics.…”

“…For the latter, the XY concentration range required for graft reaction is an order of magnitude higher than its value for ceric ion–XY redox pair 11…”

“…Previous reports on the graft copolymerization of acrylonitrile11 and of acrylic acid12 on kenaf fibers and MC, respectively, by a ceric ion–XY redox pair showed that they were influenced by two kinetically controlled reactions associated with a p‐xylyl radical species and its diradical derivative, resulting in minimum and maximum graft yields.…”

“…The minimum and maximum graft yields of 61 and 128% correspond to XY concentrations of 3.73 × 10 −3 and 5.60 × 10 −3 M respectively. The profile of the post minimal graft yield may be associated with initiation of the graft reaction by a diradical species (II) derived from the mutual interactions of two p‐xylyl radicals (I):11–12 …”