Oxycellulose reducing

Hydrocellulose differs from hydrated cellulose in its properties (Ref 3). According to Stettbacher (Ref 5) hydrocellulose lies between the hydrated cellulose and oxycellulose. Its use as a flash reducer in a propellant has been claimed by C.R. Franklin in USP 1564549 (1925) CA 20, 505 (1926). Accdg to CIOS Rept 31-68 (1945), pp 6-7, hydrocellulose was used during WWII by Germans in some rocket propellants, presumably to improve their burning characteristics. For instance the so-called Ammon-pulver contained 5% hydrocellulose and the EP (Einheitspulver) contained about 3%. Hydrocellulose was also used in some rocket propellants to increase the rate of burning at low temperature... 

Sodium hydroxide solution partially dissolves oxycellulose. The remaining insoluble fraction does not possess reducing properties. The tensile strength of oxycellulose fibres is lower than that of cellulose fibres, but depending on the mode of preparation they may possess a higher strength than hydrocellulose fibres. 

Linen cellulose hydrolyzes at the acetal link. In acidic or neutral conditions, reducing oxycellulose is formed in alkaline conditions, a nonreducing oxycellulose is formed. The new end groups produced, then, are aldehydic in the first case and carboxylic in the second case. Hydrolysis and oxidation are nonuniform amorphous areas are attacked first (10). 

Oxycellulose and phenylhydrazine gave a yellow compound, which formed a diphenylformazan, showing that the oxycellulose had reacted in one of the two possible hemiacetal forms. Aminophenols and oxycellulose gave derivatives which coupled with diazonium compounds, enabling chemically colored fibers to be prepared. Reduction of oxycellulose oxime with lithium aluminum hydride, sodium borohydride, or sodium amalgam gave an amino-oxycellulose (109) in which up to 25 % of the oxime groups had been reduced. ... 

The methods which are used are based on identification of carboxyl or reducing aldehyde groups, or on measuring the decrease in the degree of polymerization. Breakdown in chain length and reducing action are common to both hydrocellulose and oxycellulose, but the acidic properties associated with the presence of carboxyl groups is a property possessed only by the latter. 

Oxidation of cellulose with potassium dichromate and sulfuric (or oxalic) acid gives, in the early stages of oxidation, a highly reducing, non-acidic, alkali-sensitive oxycellulose which is similar to periodate oxycellulose. However, the attack of chromic acid on the cellulose molecule is not, as in periodate oxidation, uniform, but is concentrated in the intercrystalline... 

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