X-RAY DIFFRACTION 



These are usually referred to as the amorphous, disordered, intermicellar, 

 or glassy fractions. Many investigators, particularly Baker and Fuller 

 (4), Gehman and Field (17), Goldfinger et al. (18), and Purves and his 

 collaborators (28) have used a variety of methods to obtain information 

 about these regions in a high-polymer material. It seems that the 

 regions contain the molecular chains in a less perfect ajrrangement, be- 

 cause, for instance, some irregularity may have prevented them from 

 reaching the proper equilibrium positions corresponding to the crystal- 



Table I 



Qualitative Inspection and Interpretation of a Typical Fiber 



X-Ray Diagram 



lized state. It is believed that one and the same chain can pass through 

 a crystalline area, enter an amorphous portion, go right through it, 

 and enter another crystalline area. This leads to the conclusion that 

 there is no sharp boundary betvteen the crystallized and disordered 

 domains but that the chains of a certain crystalline region somehow 

 became disordered, degenerate into fringes, and, finally, reach a com- 

 pletely disordered arrangement. Hence it may be appropriate, not to 

 make a sharp distinction between chains in a crystallized or amorphous 

 state, but rather to consider various degrees of disorder, just as one may 

 observe metallic inixed crystals which have the same composition but a 

 different arrangement of their constituents. Baker, Fuller, and Pape 

 (4) have suggested the existence of a me somorphous phase in such materials 

 as cellulose acetate or nylon; and Taylor (29) has repeatedly empha- 



443 



