The rheological and mechanical properties of crosslinked polymer gels arise from the structure of the gel network. In turn, the structure of the gel network results from: thermodynamically determined interactions between the polymer chain segments, the interactions of the crosslinking metal ion with the polymer, and the deformation history of the network. Interpretations of mechanical and rheological measurements on polymer gels invariably begin with a conceptual model of,the microstructure of the gel network derived from polymer kinetic theory. In the present work, we use freeze-etch replication TEM to image the polymer network morphology of titanium crosslinked hydroxypropyl guars in an attempt to directly relate macroscopic phenomena with network structure.
