Residence Time Distribution Study of a Living/Controlled Radical Miniemulsion Polymerization System in a Continuous Tubular Reactor

Residence time distribution (RTD) studies were done to determine the flow characteristics in a continuous tubular reactor. Pulse tracer experiments were done at different flow rates and temperatures, and a comparison was made between a homogeneous aqueous salt mixture versus a heterogeneous miniemulsion mixture. The heterogeneous system was studied under two different conditions, one with a monomer-in-water droplet dispersion and one with fully formed polymer particles dispersed in water. There were differences observed between all of the systems tested and none of them matched an ideal plug flow condition. The reactor contains stagnant zones of varying volume and tracer spreading was observed in all cases. The dispersion model was found to model the system quite well in most cases.