Progress in the polycarboxylate superplasticizer and their structure-activity relationship – A review

As one important auxiliary, superplasticizers have attracted lots of attention in the concrete and building materials field. Specially, polycarboxylate superplasticizer (PCE) has been widely applied due to its relatively low doping amount, high water reducing rate and environmental friendliness property. In this review, the properties of PCE were systematically investigated based on their different molecular architecture, anchoring groups, various main/side chains and diverse topological structures. Notably, we discussed the advantages and disadvantages of different anchoring groups, carboxyl density, molecular weight, conformation, group connection mode, the density and length of the side chain on their concrete performance. What’s more, based on the topological structure of polycarboxylate polymer, we summarized their influence to concrete performance. This kind of systematic review provides a good basis for the study of structure-activity relationship of PCE.