Nineteen fractions of cellulose
tris[(3,5-dimethylphenyl)carbamate] (CTDC) ranging
in
weight-average molecular weight M
w from 2.5 ×
104 to 7.5 × 106 have been studied by static
light
scattering, sedimentation equilibrium, and viscometry in
1-methyl-2-pyrrolidone at 25 °C. Since this
cellulose derivative exhibits pronounced optical anisotropy,
light-scattering data are corrected for the
anisotropy effect on the basis of Nagai theory for the Kratky−Porod
(KP) wormlike chain with cylindrically
symmetric polarizabilities. It is shown that the data for
〈S
2〉z (the z-average
mean-square radius of
gyration), δ (the optical anisotropy factor), and [η] (the
intrinsic viscosity) and those reported previously
for 11 fractions are described accurately by the known theories for the
unperturbed KP chain if M
w is
lower than 7 × 105. From the comparison, the
persistence length and the monomeric projection of the
CTDC chain are estimated to be 7.8 and 0.52 nm, respectively. When
M
w exceeds 106, i.e., when
n
K (the
Kuhn segment number) increases above 50, excluded-volume effects on
〈S
2〉z and [η] become
experimentally
observable. Though such a large n
K value
for the appearance of volume effects has been considered
inconsistent with the Yamakawa−Stockmayer−Shimada (YSS) theory for
KP or helical wormlike chains,
the observed excluded-volume effects are found to be explained
quantitatively in the YSS scheme, i.e., by
the YSS perturbation theory combined with the Domb−Barrett function
for the radius expansion factor
and the Barrett function for the viscosity expansion factor. Thus,
this theoretical scheme should have a
wider applicability than what might be anticipated from earlier
studies.