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Physiological functions of a biomacromolecule seem to be closely related to its molecular conformations. The knowledge of any conformational changes due to changes in its environment may lead to a proper understanding of its functions. Hyaluronic acid, a biomacromolecule with unusually high molecular weight and some important biological functions is the subject of the present work. A temperature-dependent transition in hyaluronate solution of 120 mg/ml concentration was observed at physiological temperature. It is shown that this temperature-dependent behavior can be related to the orientational polarizability term in the Debye theory of polar molecules in liquids.

A resonant microwave cavity technique was employed to study the dielectric behavior of some polar and non-polar liquids near the phase transition temperatures at microwave frequencies of 7.2, 9.2 and 10.1 GHz. The Slater perturbation equations for a resonant microwave cavity are briefly discussed to show that the above technique can be used to determine both the real and imaginary parts of dielectric response. Abrupt changes in dielectric response were observed near the phase transition temperatures for the polar liquids studied in this investigation. The dielectric relaxation phenomenon in liquids has been treated as a chemical rate process and the abrupt change in the dielectric response of the liquids near phase transition temperatures is shown to be related to the dramatic changes in the free energy of activation of the molecules. Some values of the free energy of activation were deduced for the various compounds from data obtained in this investigation.