✍ Scribed by Yen Wei; Edward J. Connors; Xinru Jia; Ce Wang
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
Free radical ring-opening polymerization of 2-methylene-1,3-dioxepane (MDP) in the presence of 2,2,6,6-tetramethyl-1-piperidinyloxy free radical (TEMPO) has been achieved to afford a chain polyester (PMDP) with di-t-butyl peroxide (DTBP) as an initiator at 125ЊC. The polydispersity of the polymers decreases as the concentration of TEMPO is increased. At high TEMPO concentrations, the polydispersity as low as 1.2 was obtained, which is below the theoretical lower limit for a conventional free radical polymerization. A linear relationship between the number-average molecular weight (M n ) and the monomer conversion was observed with the best-fit line passing very close to the origin of the M n -conversion plot. The isolated and purified TEMPOcapped PMDP polymers have been employed to prepare chain extended polymers upon addition of more MDP monomer. These results are suggestive of the ''living'' polymerization process. A possible polymerization mechanism might involve thermal homolysis of the TEMPO-PMDP bonds followed by the addition of the monomers.
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