Photoinitiating capabilities of vinyl polyperoxides and metamorphosis of block-into-block copolymer

✍ Scribed by K. Subramanian; K. Kishore

• Book ID: 102658702
• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1996
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 501 KB
• Volume: 34
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0887-624X
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1099-0518(19961130)34:16<3361::aid-pola13>3.0.co;2-e

✦ Synopsis

This article describes the first comprehensive study on the use of a vinyl polyperoxide, namely poly(styrene peroxide) (PSP), an equimolar alternating copolymer of oxygen and styrene, as a photoinitiator for free radical polymerization of vinyl monomers like styrene. The molecular weight, yield, structure and thermal stability of polystyrene (PS) thus obtained are compared with PS made using a simple peroxide like di-t-butyl peroxide. Interestingly, the PS prepared using PSP contained PSP segments attached to its backbone preferably at the chain ends. This PSP-PS-PSP was further used as a thermal macroinitiator for the preparation of another block copolymer PS-b-PMMA by reacting PSP-PS-PSP with methyl methacrylate (MMA). The mechanism of block copolymerization has been discussed.