Polymers (Mar 2018)

Structural Investigation of Poly(ethylene furanoate) Polymorphs

  • Lucia Maini,
  • Matteo Gigli,
  • Massimo Gazzano,
  • Nadia Lotti,
  • Dimitrios N. Bikiaris,
  • George Z. Papageorgiou

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/polym10030296
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 10, no. 3
p. 296

Abstract

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α and β crystalline phases of poly(ethylene furanoate) (PEF) were determined using X-ray powder diffraction by structure resolution in direct space and Rietveld refinement. Moreover, the α’ structure of a PEF sample was refined from data previously reported for PEF fiber. Triclinic α-PEF a = 5.729 Å, b = 7.89 Å, c = 9.62 Å, α = 98.1°, β = 65.1°, γ = 101.3°; monoclinic α’-PEF a = 5.912 Å, b = 6.91 Å, c = 19.73 Å, α = 90°, β = 90°, γ = 104.41°; and monoclinic β-PEF a = 5.953 Å, b = 6.60 Å, c = 10.52 Å, α = 90°, β = 107.0°, γ = 90° were determined as the best fitting of X-ray diffraction (XRD) powder patterns. Final atomic coordinates are reported for all polymorphs. In all cases PEF chains adopted an almost planar configuration.

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