Ethyl glyoxylate PEtG

Ethyl glyoxylate (EtG) spontaneously polymerizes at room temperature. A distillation step on P2O5 is first necessary to break the oligomers and obtain pure EtG. A previous study on the polymerization of EtG (2) showed that the optimum conditions are to work in CH2CI2 at -20°C, with triethylamine as an initiator. A lot of transfer reactions occur in the medium leading to low molar masses and to a hydroxyl ended PEtG. 

Anionic polymerization of EtG leads to a new synthetic biodegradable polymer, namely poly(ethyl glyoxylate). Because of a low ceiling temperature and transfer reactions, PEtG has hydroxyl ends that can be end-capped with phenyl isocyanate. 

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