STUDIES ON THE EXCIMER FLUORESCENCE AND THE STERIC TACTICITY OF POLYPHENYLSILSESQUIOXANES

The steric tacticity of polyphenylsilsesquioxanes (PPS) was studied by exeimer fluorescence spectroscopy. It was found that the fluorescence of PPS come mainly from its intramolecular excimers, The experimental results indicated that the steric-structure of PPS is most probably cisisotactic rather than the cis-syndiotactic as suggested in the literature. With the increase in defect content monomer fluorescence intensity increases because of the enhanced mobility of phenyl groups. Molecular weights and molecular weight distributions do not affect the fluorescence spectra of PPS.     

STUDIES ON REGULARITY OF POLY PHENYLSILSESQUIOXANE CHAINS

IR and ~(29)Si NMR were used to determine the structures of ladderlike polymer polyphenylsilsesquioxanes (PPS). It was found that PPS with lots of defects had a wide and strong absorption band in 1000—1400 cm~(-1) with only one sharp peak at 1137 cm~(-1) while two peaks (1130 and 1045 cm~(-1) were observed for PPS with perfect ladderlike structure. Branching and crosslinking of PPS lead to the reduction of 1045 cm~(-1) peak. ~(29)Si NMR spectra, however, showed two peaks (δ=-78 ppm and -87 ppm when δ_(HMDS)=0 ppm) for defective or branched PPS. The -87 ppm peak is related to the ladderlikely constructed Si atoms and -78 ppm corresponds to defective Si atoms. PPS with defects less than 0.1% chain units was obtained by azeotropic polycondensations.     

SYNTHESES AND STRUCTURES OF POLYPHENYLSILSESQUIOXANES

Phenyltrichlorosilane was hydrolyzed both ifi. toluene and in ether from which two kinds of prepolymers were obtained with different structures, molecular weights, and molecular weight distributions. Polymers were prepared from the prepolymers in various polymerization conditions. The ladderlike, branched, and crosslinked structures formed under different polymerization conditions were characterized by means of FTIR, ~1H and ~(29)Si-NMR, and elemental analysis. Azeotropic distillation of solvents and H_2O formed during polymerization was found useful in removing H_2O from the system and high molecular weight products with perfect ladderlike structure were obtained.     

MORE ON THE STRUCTURES OF POLYPHENYLSILSESQUIOXANES

The steric tacticity of polyphenylsilsesquioxanes is discussed based on both structure transformation consideration and the results of calculations, X-ray diffraction patterns, fluorescence emission spectroscopy, and scanning electron microscopy. All of the results show that cis-isotactic conformation is the most probable one for ladderlike polymer polyphenylsilsesquioxane though other conformations such as cissyndiotactic may also be present in the macromolecules depending upon the preparation conditions.     

SOLUTION PROPERTIES OF LADDER-LIKE POLYMER POLYPHENYLSILSESQUIOXANES

Solution properties of ladder-like polymer polyphenylsilsesquioxane (PPS) were studied by measurement of intrinsic viscosity, small angle laser light scattering and gel permeation chromatography. It was found that PPS can be modeled with a wormlike continuous cylinder rather than a wormlike coil. A plot of (M~2/[η])~(1/3) vs. M~(1/2) was employed in obtaining the persistence length (2λ)~(-1) and effective hydrodynamic diameter. When MW≤5×10~5, Mark-Houwink equation is adequate in describing the relationship between MW and [η] with αabout unity. This implies that PPS chain is semi-stiff. For GPC experiments, it was shown that universal calibration can be applied in PPS. When molecular weights of PPS are sufficiently high, their molecular weight distributions are often very broad.