Backbone microstructure

Scheme 4.7 Primary structure in polyurethanes backbone microstructure.

Considerations of the primary chemical structure (e.g., molecular composition, backbone microstructure, chain length, crosslinking) of urethane polymers are... 

Figure 12.4 Backbone microstructure of PPV prepared by ROMP of asymmetric cyclophanedienes.

There are methods to manipulate the backbones of polymers in several areas that include control of microstructures such as crystallinity, precise control of molecular weight, copolymerization of additives (flame retardants), antioxidants, stabilizers, etc.), and direct attachment of pigments. A major development with all this type action has been to provide significant reduction in the variability of plastic performances, more processes can run at room temperature and atmospheric pressure, and 80% energy cost reductions. 

Functionalized polyethylene would be of great industrial importance, and if synthetic methods to control the microstructure of functionalized polymers using transition-metal-based catalysis are developed, it would significantly broaden the utility and range of properties of this class of polymers. Recent progress in the field of late transition metal chemistry, such as Brookliart s use of nickel-based diimine catalysts, has enabled the copolymerization of ethylene with functional a-olefins.29 However, these systems incorporate functionalized olefins randomly and with limited quantity (mol percent) into the polymer backbone. 

The proton decoupled carbon 13 NMR spectra for three poly( cyclohexylmethyl-co-isopropylmethyl) copolymers are shown in Figure 4. The backbone methyl group is observed as occurring between -4 and -1 ppm and consists of multiple resonances which are due to polymer microstructure. Multiple resonances are also observed for the methyl and tertiary carbon of the isopropyl group and for the methine carbon of the cyclohexyl group. Microstruc-tural assignments for these resonances remain to be made. It has also been found that increasing the bulky character of the substituent yielded broader resonance peaks in the carbon-13 NMR spectra. 

The past two decades have produced a revival of interest in the synthesis of polyanhydrides for biomedical applications. These materials offer a unique combination of properties that includes hydrolytically labile backbone, hydrophobic bulk, and very flexible chemistry that can be combined with other functional groups to develop polymers with novel physical and chemical properties. This combination of properties leads to erosion kinetics that is primarily surface eroding and offers the potential to stabilize macromolecular drugs and extend release profiles from days to years. The microstructural characteristics and inhomogeneities of multi-component systems offer an additional dimension of drug release kinetics that can be exploited to tailor drug release profiles. 

Snapshots of the final microstructure at A= 9 (RH = 94%), predicted by DPD calculations. Nation backbones are shown in black, the first side-chain beads are shown in white, and the second side chain beads, water and hydronium ions are shown in gray. (M. Malek et al. Journal of Chemical Physics 129 (2008) 204702.)... 

In order to understand monolithic supports and the effects of polymerization parameters, a brief description of the general construction of a monolith in terms of microstructure, backbone and relevant abbreviations is given in Fig. 8.1 [63, 64]. As can be deduced therefrom, monoliths consist of interconnected microstrac-ture-forming microglobules, which are characterized by a certain diameter dp) and microporosity (gp). In addition, the monolith is characterized by an inter-microglobule void volume sfj, which is mainly responsible for the backpressure at a certain flow rate. The sum of gp and g directly translates into the total porosity gf. 

It should be mentioned that donor substitution of the phenylene backbone of the salphen ligand was shown to have a decreasing effect on activity [103], which explains the overall lower productivity compared with halogen-substituted chromium salphens. However, experiments clearly proved an increased activity upon dimerization. Whereas the monomeric complex m = 4) converts about 30% of p-BL in 24 h, producing a molecular weight of 25,000 g/mol, the corresponding dimer yields up to 99% conversion with > 100,000 g/mol. Moreover, the smaller polydispersity (PD < 2) shows the better polymerization control, which is attributed to the decreased rate of polymer chain termination. This behavior is caused by the stabilization of the coordinated chain end by the neighboring metal center, as recently reported for dual-site copolymerizations of CO2 with epoxides [104-106]. The polymeric products feature an atactic microstructure since the... 

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