Optical activity of the anisotropic solutions of cellulose acetates in mesophasogenic solvents

Abstract

The optical activity of the cholesteric liquid crystalline phases of solutions of cellulose diacetate in nitromethane and dimethylsulfoxide was studied. These systems exhibited optical activity anisotropy (i.e. the value of the specific optical rotation [α] varied with the orientation of the specimen). The contributions of the isotropic component and the anisotropic components of [α] were identified. The harmonic decomposition of the anisotropic component identified the separate contributions from the primary and secondary structures of the polymer and from the supramolecular twisted helicoidal structure of the cholesteric phase.

Keywords:

• chiral
• disorder
• optics
• polysaccharides
• supramolecular structures
• solution properties
• optical activity

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research (Grant numbers 06-08-00892a and 09-03-12193ofi-m). We thank Mr D.N. Tychinin for his assistance in preparing this manuscript.