Title: crosslinking
Long Title: IUPAC Gold Book - crosslinking
DOI: 10.1351/goldbook.CT07136
Status: current

Definition
Reaction involving sites or groups on existing macromolecules or an interaction between existing macromolecules that results in the formation of a small region in a macromolecule from which at least four chains emanate.

Notes
1) The small region may be an atom, a group of atoms, or a number of branch points connected by bonds, groups of atoms, or oligomeric chains.
2) A reaction of a reactive chain end of a linear macromolecule with an internal reactive site of another linear macromolecule results in the formation of a branch point, but is not regarded as a crosslinking reaction.

Related Terms
- crosslink: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/C01409
- linear macromolecule: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/L03554
- oligomeric: https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/O04286

Source
- PAC, 2007, 79, 1801. 'Definitions of terms relating to the structure and processing of sols, gels, networks, and inorganic-organic hybrid materials (IUPAC Recommendations 2007)' on page 1821 (https://doi.org/10.1351/pac200779101801)

Other Outputs
- html: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/CT07136/html
- json: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/CT07136/json
- xml: https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/CT07136/xml

Citation: Citation: 'crosslinking' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351/goldbook.CT07136
License: The IUPAC Gold Book is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike CC BY-SA 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) for individual terms.
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Disclaimer: The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) is continuously reviewing and, where needed, updating terms in the Compendium of Chemical Terminology (the IUPAC Gold Book). Users of these terms are encouraged to include the version of a term with its use and to check regularly for updates to term definitions that you are using.
Accessed: 2025-11-15T04:56:30+00:00