An overview on the the processing of polymers growth rate data and on the methods to verify the accuracy of the input parameters in crystallization regime analysis

This work reviews criteria for the successful application of regime analysis to polymers and also discusses the influence of accuracy of input variables on the results. Despite that it has often been stated that the uncertainty in the input parameters remarkably affects the trustworthiness of the outcomes of the regime analysis, the literature offers on the subject only a fragmentary information and there is no paper looking over all the effects of accuracy of the input parameters. Here the influence of errors in input parameters has been investigated and methods to test the reliability of thermodynamic outcomes have been discussed. Mathematical ways to ascertain the accuracy of the input parameters consist in comparisons between the growth rates expressed by the Hoffman-Lauritzen equation and their derivatives generated by means of the output of the regime analysis. These comparisons, under the hypothesis of validity of the secondary nucleation theory, allow excluding the presence of remarkable errors in input values and variables. 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved