Highly Efficient Ruthenium‐Based Catalytic Systems for the Controlled Free‐Radical Polymerization of Vinyl Monomers

A new set of ruthenium complexes such as 1 and 2 (the Grubbs ruthenium–carbene complex) has been shown to mediate the controlled atom‐transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) of vinyl monomers with exceptional efficiency. Furthermore, there is a striking parallelism between the catalytic activity of these compounds in olefin metathesis and in ATRP.