Grafting of polymers onto and/or from silica surface during the polymerization of vinyl monomers in the presence of γ‐ray‐irradiated silica

The effects of radicals on silica surface, which were formed by γ‐ray irradiation, on the polymerization of vinyl monomers were investigated. It was found that the polymerization of styrene was remarkably retarded in the presence of γ‐ray‐irradiated silica above 60 °C, at which thermal polymerization of styrene is readily initiated. During the polymerization, a part of polystyrene formed was grafted onto the silica surface but percentage of grafting was very small. On the other hand, no retardation of the polymerization of styrene was observed in the presence of γ‐ray‐irradiated silica below 50 °C; the polymerization tends to accelerate and polystyrene was grafted onto the silica surface. Poly(vinyl acetate) and poly(methyl methacrylate) (MMA) were also grafted onto the surface during the polymerization in the presence of γ‐ray‐irradiated silica. The grafting of polymers onto the silica surface was confirmed by thermal decomposition GC‐MS. It was considered that at lower temperature, the grafting based on the propagation of polystyrene from surface radical (“grafting from” mechanism) preferentially proceeded. On the contrary, at higher temperature, the coupling reaction of propagating polymer radicals with surface radicals (“grafting onto” mechanism) proceeded to give relatively higher molecular weight polymer‐grafted silica. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 44: 2972–2979, 2006     

Simultaneous determination of mass-dependent isotopic fractionation and radiogenic isotope variation of strontium in geochemical samples by multiple collector-ICP-mass spectrometry.

We present a method to determine (88)Sr/(86)Sr and (87)Sr/(86)Sr simultaneously. The former variation reflects the mass-dependent isotopic fractionation through the physico-chemical processes, and the latter originates from beta(-)-decay of the parent nuclide (87)Rb as well as the mass-dependent isotopic fractionation. In order to determine the mass-dependent isotopic fractionation, the mass-discrimination effect on (88)Sr/(86)Sr was externally corrected by an exponential law using Zr. For the radiogenic growth of (87)Sr/(86)Sr, the mass-dependent isotopic fractionation effect on (87)Sr/(86)Sr was corrected by a conventional correction technique using the (88)Sr/(86)Sr ratio. The reproducibility of the (88)Sr/(86)Sr and (87)Sr/(86)Sr measurements for a high-purity Sr chemical reagent was 0.06 per thousand (2SD, n = 20) and 0.07 per thousand (2SD, n = 20), respectively. Strontium isotopic ratios ((88)Sr/(86)Sr and (87)Sr/(86)Sr) were measured on six geochemical reference materials (igneous rock: JB-1a and JA-2; carbonate mineral: JLs-1, JDo-1, JCp-1 and JCt-1) and one seawater sample. The resulting (87)Sr/(86)Sr ratios obtained here were consistent with previously published data within the analytical uncertainties. The resulting (88)Sr/(86)Sr ratios for igneous rock samples did not vary significantly within the samples, whereas the carbonate samples showed enrichments of the lighter Sr isotopes over the seawater sample. The (88)Sr/(86)Sr ratio of geochemical samples could reflect the physico-chemical processes for the sample formation. Also, a combined discussion of (88)Sr/(86)Sr and (87)Sr/(86)Sr of samples will render multi-dimensional information on geochemical processes.     

Precise control of microstructure of functionalized polypropylene synthesized by the ansa‐zirconocene/ MAO catalysts

We inclusively investigated polymerization behavior and structure of copolymer in the copolymerization of propylene and alkylaluminum‐protected polar allyl monomers. The control of the arrangement of polar group in the copolymer was discussed. It was proved that the location of polar group could be controlled by zirconocene catalyst and a kind of polar monomer. The indenyl or the 2‐methylindenyl ligands of zirconocene were favored to produce end‐functionalized polymers. It was also found that the trimethylaluminum‐protected allylamine and triisobutylaluminum‐protected allylmercaptan had superior ability in the synthesis of end‐functionalized polypropylene. On the other hand, the 2‐methyl‐4‐phenylindenyl ligand produced the copolymers containing both the end‐polar unit and inner‐polar unit at the polymer chains. Terpolymerization of propylene, polar allyl monomer, and 5‐hexen‐1‐ol was also conducted. The NMR study of the terpolymer revealed that both the 5‐hexen‐1‐ol and the polar allyl monomer were incorporated into the polymer chain. It has also become apparent that the polar allyl monomer units predominantly occupied the chain end, while the 5‐hexen‐1‐ol units were located at the inner of main chain. Consequently, we have achieved the synthesis of functionalized polypropylene in which the arrangement of polar group was precisely controlled. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 46: 1738–1748, 2008     

Anionic alternating copolymerization of a bifunctional six‐membered lactone and glycidyl phenyl ether: Selective synthesis of a linear polyester having lactone moiety

An imidazole‐initiated copolymerization of an aromatic bislactone, 10‐methyl‐2H,8H‐benzo[1,2‐b:5,4‐b′]bipyran‐2,8‐dione ( 1 ), and glycidyl phenyl ether (GPE) was investigated. In spite of the bifunctional nature of 1 that would potentially permit formation of networked and thus insoluble polymers upon its copolymerization, only one of the two lactone moieties of 1 exclusively underwent the copolymerization to give a linear polyester. Spectroscopic analysis of the polyester and its reductive scission into the corresponding fragment revealed that the polyester was formed by a 1:1 alternating copolymerization of GPE and the lactone moiety of 1 . The other lactone in 1 that did not participate in the copolymerization was quantitatively incorporated into the side chain of the polyester as a reactive site, of which ring‐opening reactions by amine and alcohol as nucleophilic reagents allowed chemoselective polymer reactions. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 47: 1661–1672, 2009     

Synthesis and crosslinking behavior of a novel linear polymer bearing 1,2,3‐triazol and benzoxazine groups in the main chain by a step‐growth click‐coupling reaction

The click‐coupling reaction was applied to polycondensation, to synthesize a high‐molecular weight prepolymer having benzoxazine moieties in the main chain. For the polycondensation, a bifunctional N‐propargyl benzoxazine was synthesized from bisphenol A, propargylamine, and formaldehyde. The propargyl group was efficiently used for the copper(I)‐catalyzed alkyne‐azide “click” reaction with p‐xylene‐α,α′‐diazide, to give the corresponding linear polycondensate having 1,2,3‐triazole junctions. The polycondensation proceeded in N,N‐dimethylformamide (DMF) at room temperature. By this highly efficient “click‐” polycondensation reaction, the benzoxazine ring in the monomer was successfully introduced into the polymer main chain without any side reaction. The obtained polymer (=prepolymer) underwent thermal crosslinking to afford the corresponding product, which was insoluble in a wide range of organic solvents and exhibited higher thermal stability than the polymer before crosslinking. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 46: 2316–2325, 2008     

Selection of modulation frequency of FT-IR equipped with an MCT detector for thin-film analysis

Optimal modulation frequency (scan rate) of an FT-IR equipped with a mercury–cadmium–telluride (MCT) detector has been investigated for obtaining high quality spectra of a monolayer-level thin film. Since an MCT detector is a semiconductor light device, it does not respond to modulation frequency significantly in comparison to a pyroelectric detector. A very thin film, however, requires high-throughput measurements to have high signal-to-noise ratio. In this study, a balance of throughput and measurement time has been investigated by varying modulation frequency by using two spectrometers that have different sampling frequencies. In this study, the stability of the baseline of absorbance spectra was also investigated depending on modulation frequencies, which suggested that 60 kHz was most suitable for quantitatively reliable transmission measurements of Langmuir–Blodgett films.