Specific swelling behaviors of poly(4-vinyl phenol) gels in tetraalkylammonium chloride solutions

Swelling behaviors of poly(4-vinyl phenol) (P4VPh) gel in aqueous tetraalkylammonium chloride (TAACl) solutions were investigated to find a very specific swelling behavior. Especially for the tetrabutylammonium chloride (TBACl) system, P4VPh gel remarkably deswelled with increasing salt concentration (/= ca. 2.1 M). A similar swelling profile was also observed in the swelling time-course; upon immersion of a water-swollen P4VPh gel into 2.5 M TBACl solution, the gel first deswelled in an early stage (approximately 0.1 h) and then remarkably reswelled with time. Relative amounts (mol/mol) of TBA cation and water per monomer residue were estimated as ca. 1 and 0 for the deswollen state and 5 and 50 for the reswollen state, respectively. This result, together with those of attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared measurements performed for the gels swollen in various kinds of TAACl and inorganic salt solutions, suggested that in the highly deswollen and almost dehydrated state, phenol rings aggregated with intervening TBA cations, while the aggregation reswelled upon further binding with TBA cations.