Synthesis of Cleavable Polymers via Oxidation of Thioether Moieties and Thiol Click Reactions: A Click-Declick Strategy

In the past decades click chemistries including thiol chemistries have found wide applications in the synthesis of well-defined polymers. In this research, a click-declick strategy based on the oxidation of heteroaromatic thioethers and the substitution reactions between the oxidized groups and thiols, is proposed for the synthesis of the cleavable polymers. In proof-of-concept experiments, block copolymers (BCPs) and star-like polymers are synthesized by thiol-phenylsulfone substitution reactions, and heteroaromatic thioethers are produced at the junction points of the BCP chains or on the crosslinking sites of the star-like polymer. The thioethers can be oxidized to heteroaromatic sulfoxides or sulfones, depending on the oxidization condition. It is demonstrated that both sulfoxides or sulfones can have base catalyzed nucleophilic substitution reactions with thiols, leading to the cleavage of the polymers.     

Metal-Catalyzed Coupling Reactions In The Synthesis Of New Conducting Polymers

The use of transition metal-catalyzed coupling reactions in the synthesis of conducting polymers is discussed. These reactions are of growing importance in polymer synthesis and are particularly important in the synthesis of highly functionalized conjugated (conducting) polymers. In this report we discuss applications of this methodology for the synthesis of conducting polymer sensory materials and polymers with reactive functional groups. In the sensory polymers we have incorporated crown ether groups which induce perturbations to the polymer's electronic structure when exposed to an alkali metal ion. Our interest in polymers with reactive functional groups is for the development of polymers which can be transformed into novel all-carbon ladder polymers.     

What really drives chemical reactions on contact charged surfaces?

Although it is known that contact-electrified polymers can drive chemical reactions, the origin of this phenomenon remains poorly understood. To date, it has been accepted that this effect is due to excess electrons developed on negatively charged surfaces and to the subsequent transfer of these electrons to the reactants in solution. The present study demonstrates that this view is incorrect and, in reality, the reactions are driven by mechanoradicals created during polymer-polymer contact.     

Adapting semiconducting polymer doping techniques to create new types of click postfunctionalization

After the historical development from the insoluble polyacetylene film to soluble and processible aromatic polymers, donor-acceptor-type aromatic polymers have recently emerged as a new class of semiconducting polymers. The polymer energy levels and band gaps can be tuned by the appropriate selection of the donor and acceptor moieties, and some of these polymers showed good optoelectronic or photovoltaic performances. The conventional synthetic method for achieving donor-acceptor-type aromatic polymers is based on the metal-catalyzed polycondensation between donor-type monomers and acceptor-type co-monomers. In this tutorial review, a new methodology for introducing donor-acceptor chromophores into semiconducting polymers is described. The donor-acceptor structures are constructed in the main chains and side chains of semiconducting polymers using a polymer reaction based on high-yielding addition reactions between the electron-rich alkynes and strong acceptor molecules, such as tetracyanoethylene (TCNE) and 7,7,8,8-tetracyanoquinodimethane (TCNQ). Considering the p-type doping features of TCNE and TCNQ, the experimental procedure is the same as the conventional doping technique for semiconducting polymers. However, the resulting donor-acceptor type polymers are chemically stable due to the absence of unstable unpaired electrons (polarons). The donor-acceptor alternating polymers were achieved in one step from the precursor poly(aryleneethynylene)s and poly(arylenebutadiynylene)s. When the side chain alkynes were post-functionalized, the polymer energy levels were controlled by the species and amount of the employed acceptor molecules. These atom-economic acceptor additions satisfy most of the requirements of the "click chemistry" concept. In contrast to the conventional click chemistry reactions, the reactions between electron-rich alkynes and acceptor molecules provide a wide variety of polymers with promising optoelectronic applications.     

Basis of Solid-Phase Grafting of Polypropylene

Abstract

The chemical modification of polymers opens new dimensions for the development and design of materials based on plastics. The chemical modification of polymers by reactions is performed by reactions in a melt, in a solution, or in a solid phase. The modification of polymers in solid phases (powder or granular material directly from the polymerization) has great advantages compared with reactions in solution or melt. The advantages are lower costs and, most important, greater creative variability. A special advantage of solid-phase modification of polypropylene (PP) is the fact that the degradation reaction is reduced.     

Chemorheology of linear polymers

The structural changes brought about by chemical reactions are reflected in the viscoelastic behavior of polymers. Viscoelastic behavior induced by such chemical reactions is called chemorheology. This phenomenon is not readily observed in linear polymers, because molecular flow by diffusion is generally much more rapid than relaxation or flow caused by chemical reaction. It has become possible, however, to treat chemorheology of linear polymers theoretically by taking such physical flow into consideration. The experimental results for linear polystyrene compared with the theoretical ones are described in this paper. Good agreement between theoretical results and experimental ones is obtained for monodisperse polystyrene with low concentration of accelerators.     

Synthesizing optoelectronic heteroaromatic conjugated polymers by cross-coupling reactions

Heteroaromatics-containing polymers comprise a huge class of materials that have received considerable attention due to their interesting electrical, electrochemical, and optical properties. In this review, the recent advances on the use of organometallic cross-coupling reactions for the synthesis of heteroaromatic conjugated polymers for the optoelectronic interests and applications are summarised.     

Triple Click Reaction Strategy for Macromolecular Diversity

This Feature Article focuses on the rapidly emerging concept of the “triple click reactions” towards the design and synthesis of macromolecules with well‐defined topology and chemical composition, and also precise molecular weight and narrow molecular weight distribution. The term “triple click reaction” used in this feature article is based on the utilization of three chemically and mechanistically different click reactions for polymer–polymer conjugation and post‐modification of the polymers. Three sequential click reactions of which two are identical should not be considered to be triple click reactions. The triple click reaction strategy for polymer conjugation and post‐modification of polymers is classified in this article based on the resultant architectures: linear and non‐linear structures.     

Reactive blending of polymers by interfacial free-radical grafting

In blends of immiscible polymers, amphiphilic species are needed for both morphological stabilization and improvement of the mechanical properties throughout successive processing steps. In order to obtain the required concentration of amphiphilic copolymer at the interface, it seemed of interest to test the possibility of creating these species by in situ reactivity at the interface, for instance by condensation reactions occurring between functionalized polymers. There is another possibility based on the fact that most of the polymers are hydrocarbon compounds, so they are subjected to free-radical reactivity by hydrogen abstraction on the different hydrocarbon sites. The created free-radical polymeric species may react together leading to the well known reactions of crosslinking, grafting and/or chain degradation. Therefore, this work deals with reciprocal free-radical reactivity of two kinds of semi-crystalline polymers, namely one polyolefin (LDPE, HDPE, PP or EPR) associated with a polyamide (PA-11 or PA-6). The reaction has to occur mainly at the interface, where the resulting grafted copolymers have to be anchored for final stabilization of the biphasic system. The level of interfacial grafting and the resulting properties of the reacted blends were characterized carefully, confirming the efficiency of the interpolymeric grafting.     

ACTIVE INTERMEDIATES IN PHOTORADICAL AGING OF POLYMERS

The data referring to the mechanism and efficiency of electronically excited macroradical and radical anionreactions, the important role of photochemical chain reactions in polymers are presented, It was found that by varying photonenergy, temperature, photolysis time and competition between thermal and photochemical reactions, it is possible to change the functional composition and molecular weight distribution of polymers.     

超高真空条件下表面辅助反应

在金属单晶表面上直接合成制备各种共价键连接聚合结构,由于其独特的路线及在电子学、光电子学等方面的潜在应用价值而得到了广泛的关注。与传统的有机合成反应不同,表面辅助反应能够在一定程度上控制产物的结构,知悉具体的反应过程,更重要的是还能制备一些采用传统方法所不能得到的新型材料。前驱体分子的种类、衬底的选择以及反应条件等因素都与反应的发生紧密相关。在表面上制备出的有序共价组装结构除了比传统的自组装单层膜(SAMs)结构具有更高的机械强度及热力学稳定性外,分子间连接的共价键还能作为电子传输的通道,使其应用范围得到很大地扩展。本文对近年来报道的超高真空环境下的一些表面辅助反应进行了介绍,分析了各个反应发生的机理,并将其与溶液中发生的反应相对比,讨论了衬底表面在反应过程中所起到的重要作用。     

Aging of 1,3-diaminopropane plasma-deposited polymer films: Mechanisms and reaction pathways

In the course of plasma deposition of organic–polymeric thin films, radicals are incorporated into the growing film. These radicals initiate spontaneous oxidation reactions that continue over many weeks when the plasma polymers are stored in air. These reactions and their products have been previously studied in detail for spectroscopically simple, hydrocarbon-based plasma polymers. In this investigation, the aging of 1,3-diaminopropane (DAP) plasma polymer samples was monitored by XPS and FTIR in order to study how the oxidative reaction pathways might differ in a plasma-deposited material that is initially rich in amine groups. The freshly deposited DAP plasma polymer consisted of a random hydrocarbon network with a considerable amount of unsaturation and a high concentration of nitrogen-containing functional groups, mainly primary/secondary amines and imines. These groups strongly influenced the aging reactions: in contrast to hydrocarbon-based material where hydrogen abstraction and reaction of carbon-centered radicals with in-diffusing oxygen result in a wide range of oxidative products, both XPS and FTIR identified a rather narrow range of products (mainly amides and similar groups) in DAP plasma polymers even after extensive aging for more than 2 years. Reaction routes based on oxidation and/or hydrolysis of nitrogen functional groups, and involving primary as well as secondary reactions, are proposed to account for the spectroscopic data. The structure of the aged DAP plasma polymer appeared to be stable, and did not undergo more extensive oxidation, in contrast to hydrocarbon plasma polymers. In particular, carboxylic acid groups and carbamates were not detected. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Polym Sci A: Polym Chem 37: 2191–2206, 1999     

Synthesis of poly(acrylic acid) nanogels by preparative pulse radiolysis

Nanogels are sub-micron size, water-swellable crosslinked structures of hydrophilic polymers. In this work a radiation-based synthesis method that has been previously tested for neutral polymers is applied for production of nanogels of a synthetic polyelectrolyte—poly(acrylic acid) (PAA). In this technique dilute, deoxygenated PAA solution (pH 2) circulating in a closed loop is subjected to pulse irradiation with fast electrons. In each pulse many tens of radicals are instantaneously formed on every macromolecule. One of the major reaction paths of these radicals is intramolecular recombination leading to the formation of nanogels. It is demonstrated that radiation-induced reactions in our system show a typical feature of intramolecular crosslinking, i.e. a strong decrease in dimensions of a polymer coil without an accompanying decrease in molecular weight. In accordance with expectations based on earlier observations on non-polar polymers, intramolecular recombination of PAA-derived radicals proceeds according to non-classical kinetics. A model of non-homogeneous kinetics with time-dependent rate constant has been applied to describe this behaviour and the relationship between kinetic parameters and initial average number of radicals per chain is briefly discussed. The weight-average molecular weight of the products is influenced by side reactions, mainly degradation (chain breakage) and intermolecular crosslinking.     

低表面能聚合物的聚合进展

低表面能聚合物材料是低表面能材料中重要的一类.这类材料性能独特,用途广泛,尤其体现在涂料领域,用作防污涂层.目前,低表面能聚合物主要有氟碳树脂、有机硅树脂及氟硅树脂三种.有关这三种材料的合成研究十分活跃,出现了众多的合成研究报道.按合成过程对应的聚合机理划分,主要有基团转移聚合、阳离子聚合、阴离子聚合、自由基聚合、活性官能团间的反应.本文按聚合机理划分方法对低表面能聚合物近期的合成研究进展进行综述.     

"Clicking" on/with polymers: a rapidly expanding field for the straightforward preparation of novel macromolecular architectures

The combination of controlled polymerization techniques and "click" reactions form an efficient platform for the preparation of polymers in various architectures. In this critical review, an update of our 2007 review in Chem. Soc. Rev., we focus on the "click" reactions that have been used widely in the last four years to create new polymer architectures. Not only block copolymers and star-shaped polymers but also cyclic and dendritic macromolecules could be synthesized using these robust "click" reactions (205 references).     

Crosslinking of ethylene-vinyl alcohol copolymers via polymeranalogous reactions

A practical model for polymeranalogous reactions is ethylene-vinyl alcohol copolymer with a controllable amount of hydroxylic groups. The reaction of the hydroxyl groups with various compounds leads to further functionalized polymers. The functional groups introduced are useful for modification or crosslinking reactions. The modification of ethylene-vinyl alcohol copolymers with carboxylic anhydrides and hydroxy carboxylic acids is the main subject of this investigation. The crosslinking reaction of these products with bifunctional epoxies was followed by means of viscosimetric measurements. The dependence of the reaction behaviour on the structure of the functionalized polymers used is discussed.     

Photochemically degradable polymers containing metal-metal bonds along their backbones: the effect of stress on the rates of photochemical degradation

The syntheses of polymers that have metal-metal bonds along their backbones are described. The polymers are photodegradable because the metal-metal bonds homolyze when irradiated with visible light. The photochemical reactions of the polymers in solution are identical to the photochemical reactions of the discrete metal-metal bonded dimers. Typical reactions include metal-metal bond disproportionation and metal radical capture, for example, by chlorine atom abstraction from carbon tetrachloride. The polymers are also photochemically degradable in the solid state; thin films of the polymers degrade when irradiated with visible light in the presence of oxygen or in the absence of oxygen if the polymer backbone has a built-in radical trap. The origin of tensile stress-induced rate enhancements in the photodegradation of polymers was studied using the polymers with metal-metal bonds along their backbones and with built-in radical traps. By eliminating the need for external oxygen to act as a radical trap, the experimentally challenging problem of diffusion-controlled oxidation kinetics was avoided. Analysis of plots of quantum yields for degradation vs. stress reveals that stress increases the separation of the radical fragments produced by photolysis. An increased separation leads to less radical-radical recombination, which increases the efficiency of degradation. Quantitative knowledge of the factors that control polymer degradation rates will eventually allow synthesis of an ideal photodegradable polymer - one that has a tunable onset of degradation and that degrades quickly once degradation has started.     

Synthese de polyalcadienes monochloroformiates. Modification chimique par des alcool,amine et thiol

Some monofunctional polydienes with various extremities are obtained by chemical modification of ω-monochloroformate polymers. The chosen products are an alcohol, an amine and a thiol. The organic compounds are attached to the end of a macromolecular chain by a carbonate, a urethane or a thiolcarbonate link. The resulting polymers are characterized by i.r. and NMR analysis. These modification reactions of end groups may be used as model reactions for polymers having specific properties.     

Recent advances of CuAAC click reaction in building cyclic polymer

Cyclic polymers have attracted more and more attentions in recent years because of their unique topological structures and characteristic properties in both solution and bulk state. There are relatively few reports on cyclic polymers, partly because of the more demanding synthetic procedures. In recent years, “click” reaction, especially Cu(I)-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition (CuAAC), has been widely utilized in the synthesis of cyclic polymer materials because of its high efficiency and low susceptibility to side reactions. In this review, we will focus on three aspects: (1) Constructions of monocyclic polymer using CuAAC “click” chemistry; (2) Formation of complex cyclic polymer topologies through CuAAC reactions; (3) Using CuAAC “click” reaction in the precise synthesis of molecularly defined macrocycles. We believe that the CuAAC click reaction is playing an important role in the design and synthesis of functional cyclic polymers.     

Synthetic strategies for the preparation of proton-conducting hybrid polymers based on PEEK and PPSU for PEM fuel cells

Synthetic strategies for the preparation of proton-conducting hybrid polymers based on Poly-Ether-Ether-Ketone (PEEK) and Poly-Phenyl-Sulfone (PPSU) are presented. Sulfonation reactions are discussed as a function of sulfonating agents and reaction conditions. Metalation reactions are also described, specifically the introduction of silanol units into the macromolecules. The objective is to improve the proton conductivity of the hybrid polymers by sulfonation, and the mechanical and thermal stabilities by introduction of silicon moieties. Examples of NMR spectra and thermogravimetric curves are shown and discussed in view of the macromolecular structure.