Competitive Effects in Polymer Adsorption and Exchangeability of Adsorption Layer

Abstract Critical experimental data on competitive adsorption and exchangeability of adsorbed polymer are produced under the various conditions using the gel permeation chromatography technique. It is apparent that the competitive effects and the exchangeability were found to depend not only on the molecular weight of the polymer, but also on the concentration of each component at which the corresponding adsorption is carried out. This can be explained as follows; the conformation of the adsorbed polymer would be influenced extensively by the polymer concentration in bulk. The polymer molecules adsorbed from a dilute solution would take on a flat conformation being rich in train segments, but the polymer layer formed under a concentrated solution would occupy a small of sites and adopt an extended loop configuration which would be desorbed more easily than the flat one. Also, in the mixed sample the effects of adsorption Kinetics play an important role on the structure of the adsorption layer, because at first the surface is convered by an adsorption layer of small components due to its rapid adsorption rate.