Kinetics analysis of degradation of polynorbornene containing aryl or hetaryl azo dye

The Vyazovkin model-free method were applied to study non-isothermal degradation of an aryl and hetaryl azo dye-containing polynorbornene using a differential scanning calorimetric (DSC) technique. The samples were heated in nitrogen, with heating rates in the range 5–50 K min−1. The isoconversional method of Vyazovkin was used to determine the variation of the activation energy for degradation with temperature, Eα(T). The values of Eα(T) were found to be almost independent of temperature. The results of isoconversional methods used suggest that the transition follows a single-step kinetics reaction mechanism.