Pulse Radiolysis Study on Aqueous Solutions of Polysaccharide Derivatives

Irradiated polysaccharides generally degrades, but some kinds of polysaccharide derivatives in an aqueous solution, for example carboxymethyl cellulose/chitin/chitosan etc, become crosslinked and form hydrogels in the case of concentrated solution. By irradiating polymer solutions, polymer radicals are produced by the reaction of polymer chains with water decompositions, OH radical and hydrated electron etc, and then the crosslinking takes place by the reaction of polymer radicals with each other. To study the early process of the gelation of polysaccharide derivatives by ionizing irradiation, we evaluated the reactivity of the reaction of polymer chains with OH radical, hydrated electron and with inorganic, sulphate or carbonate radicals by pulse radiolysis technique.