Chemically modified polymers

A process for preparing chemically modified olefin homopolymers or olefin copolymers which consists of reacting about 60 to about 98% by weight of an olefin homopolymer or olefin copolymer with about 1 to about 30% by weight of a co-reactant, said co-reactant being a non-polymeric organic compound having the generalized structure R-X, where R is a saturated linear, branched or cyclic aliphatic hydrocarbon residue containing at least six carbon atoms, and X is at least one highly polar functional group selected from the group consisting of hydroxyl (--OH);

• carboxyl (--COOH);
• amide (--CONH.sub.2);
• disubstituted amide (--CONR.sub.1 R.sub.2), where R.sub.1 and R.sub.2 are the same or different lower alkyls containing one to four carbons;
• amino (--NH.sub.2);
• disubstituted amino (--NR.sub.1 R.sub.2), where R.sub.1 and R.sub.2 are the same or different lower alkyls containing one to four carbons;
• trialkoxysilyl ##EQU2## where R.sub.1, R.sub.2 and R.sub.3 are lower alkyls containing one to four carbons, dihydrogen phosphate (--OPO.sub.3 H.sub.3);
• carboxylate (--COO.sup.-);
• and ammonium (--NR.sub.1 R.sub.2 R.sub.3), where R.sub.1, R.sub.2 and R.sub.3 are hydrogens or lower alkyls containing one to six carbons, said reaction being conducted in the presence of about 1% to about 20% by weight of a source capable of generating free radicals and in the presence of a stimulus selected from heat, light, oxygen, organic compound free-radical initiating reagents, and combinations thereof to cause said generation of free radicals.