Radiation-Induced Graft Copolymerization of Acrylonitrile onto Kappa-Carrageenan

The monomer, acrylonitrile, was graft copolymerized onto kappa-carrageenan (kC) using γ-rays as initiator. The reactions were carried out in a homogenous aqueous medium. After removal of the homopolymer, the graft copolymer was characterized by FTIR spectroscopy. A plausible mechanism of grafting has also been suggested. The effect of various factors affecting on grafting, i.e. dose of δ-rays and concentration of the monomer and polysaccharide as well as the reaction temperature were studied by conventional methods to achieve the optimum grafting parameters. The graft copolymerization reactions were kinetically investigated using semi-empirical expressions and a suitable rate expression has been derived.