APPLICATION OF THE BLOB MODEL TO THE CALCULATION OF COOPERATIVE AND SELF-DIFFUSION COEFFICIENTS IN POLYMER-SOLUTIONS

The concentration and temperature dependences of the cooperative and self-diffusion coefficients for semidilute polymer solutions are discussed by using the blob model. The blob model is shown to be particularly useful in describing the behavior of these quantities near the crossover from the semidilute good-solvent region to the semidilute θ-solvent region of the temperature-concentration diagram. Universal plots for the cooperative and self-diffusion coefficients are proposed, and theoretical predictions are compared with experimental results from the literature. © 1990, American Chemical Society. All rights reserved.