Jeong Seung-Yong, Ma Yung-Dae
2006
Citations
0
Influential Citations
1
Citations
Journal
Polymer-korea
Abstract
Fully or nearly fully(8-cholesteryloxycarbonyl)heptanoated polysaccharide derivatives were synthesized by reacting cellulose, amylose, chitosan, chitin, alginic acid, pullulan or amylopectin with (8-cholesteryloxycarbonyl)heptanoyl chloride (CH8C), and their thermotropic liquid crystalline behaviors were investigated. Like in the case of CH8C, all the polysaccharide derivatives formed monotropic cholesteric phases with left-handed helicoidal structures whose optical pitches decrease with increasing temperature. Amylopectin derivative also formed a monotropic cholesteric phase with lefthanded helicoidal structures but, in contrast with the other derivatives, did not display reflection colors over the full cholesteric range, suggesting that the helicoidal twisting power of the cholesteryl group highly depends on the branched structure in amylopectin. The thermal stability and degree of order in the mesophase, the magnitude of at the same temperature, and the temperature dependence of the observed for polysaccharide derivatives were entirely different from those reported for the polymers in which the cholesteryl groups are attached to flexible or semiflexible backbones through flexible spacers. The results were discussed in terms of the difference in the chemical structures of the main and side chains and flexibility of the main chain.