Appeal No. 2002-0984
Application 09/246,179
monitored during the process and are used to determine the
progress of the reaction as determined by the infrared attenuated
total reflectance spectrophotometer. In the third step, the IR-
ATR probe is immersed in "an agitated reactor" which reactor
contains the "polymeric product" and other unidentified
reactants. The "contents" of the reactor have a maximum viscosity
of 10,000 Pas2 and a "flow velocity" of from 0.01 to 10 meters
per second at the probe location. In the fourth step, the
absorption of the contents of the agitated reactor is measured
during the "production" or "modification" reaction using the IR-
ATR probe to measure the absorption. In the fifth step, the
absorption values measured in the fourth step are used to
calculate the "degree of conversion and/or degree of
modification" of the contents of the agitated reactor. Stated
another way, the values measured for the absorption of the
particular species being monitored indicate the progress of the
reaction in the agitated reactor. According to the fifth step of
the process, the degree of modification ( M(t)) or the degree of
conversion (U(t)) of the species of interest being monitored are
calculated using one of two formulae. We observe that the
formulae are identical. Thus, the formulae require that the ratio
2 Pas or Pa!s is the abbreviation for Pascal second. 1 Pas
is equal to 1000 centipoise (dynamic viscosity). Water, for
example, has a viscosity at 20°C of 1.00 centipoise or 0.001 Pas.
5
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