Attempt to control monomer sequences in copolycondensations of IPA,TPA, BPA,and PHB

Copolycondensations of IPA, TPA, BPA, and PHB were studied to investigate how PHB, which can form mesogenic segments, should be incorporated into the amorphous IPA/TPA–BPA polyester to obtain the thermotropic copolyester, unlike other copolymerizations studied so far by randomly introducing nonmesogenic components into the liquid crystalline polyesters. Random and controlled copolycondensations were attempted to regulate the segment length of mesogenic PHB units by stepwise addition of BPA and PHB through the two- and three-stage reactions using TsCl/DMF/Py as a condensing agent. Thermotropic copolyesters with ca. 40 mol % PHB could be obtained by a three-stage reaction, despite that more than 70 mol % PHB is needed to prepare by usual random copolymerization with PHB. The segment length of the PHB unit was indirectly studied from IPA/TPA–BPA oligomer distribution at initial reaction by means of GPC and from the NMR analysis of the resulting copolymers. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Polym Sci A: Polym Chem 37: 2371–2377, 1999