Cage effect

In chemistry, the cage effect[1] (also known as geminate recombination[2]) describes how the properties of a molecule are affected by its surroundings.

In polymers, the probability of a free radical pair to escape recombination in the cage is 0.1 – 0.01 and 0.3-0.8 in liquids.

[5] In unimolecular chemistry, geminate recombination has first been studied in the solution phase using iodine molecules[10] and heme proteins.

[9] According to mathematical models, Fc is dependent on changes on several parameters including radical size, shape, and solvent viscosity.

Due to the cage effect, free radicals can undergo mutual deactivation which produces stable products instead of initiating propagation – reducing the value of ƒ.