STUDY OF INTERNAL-MODES OF A LIVING POLYMER BY TRANSIENT ELECTRIC BIREFRINGENCE

Abstract

We use a pulsed electric field to study transient electric birefringence in "living polymers." The decay of birefringence is nonexponential and depends on the pulse width of the electric field. The relaxation is modeled in terms of the collective modes of the individual polymers with Zimm dynamics. Using this model, we find that the living polymer behaves as a flexible chain even at very low concentrations. Two distinct growth regimes are found for the polymer contour length LBAR as a function of surfactant concentration-phi. In the very dilute regime LBAR increases as square-root-phi, and levels off at higher concentrations.