A Straightforward Estimation of Activation and Deactivation Parameters for ATRP Systems from Actual Polymerization Rate and Molecular Weight Distribution Data

The accuracy of a model prediction relies heavily on the quality of the parameters used. Some of the available methods to estimate the activation and deactivation rate constants in atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) are done in the absence of monomer, hence they may not be representative of the polymerization conditions. Others offer great accuracy but requires data that are not commonly measured in experiments. In this study, a simple method is proposed to estimate activation and deactivation rate constants through correlating the recently reported theoretical equations with experimental data of monomer conversion and polymer molecular weight dispersity. The kinetics and dispersity equations used are straightforward and explicit, thus can be easily calculated. Only two parameters (activation and deactivation rate constant) are involved in the correlation of two data sets without any other adjustable parameters. In addition, the experimental data required are some of the most often measured quantities in polymerization, thus no additional experiments or measurements are required. Since the conversion and dispersity are obtained from actual polymerization, the reaction rate constants estimated are representative of the real reaction conditions. The applicability of this method is demonstrated by estimating parameters using reported experimental data of ATRP of methyl methacrylate conducted at various conditions. image