High molecular weight polymers methacrylate groups, radical polymerization

Polymerization of methacrylates is also possible via what is known as group-transfer polymerization. Although only limited commercial use has been made of this technique, it does provide a route to block copolymers that is not available from ordinary free-radical polymerizations. In a prototypical group-transfer polymerization the fluoride-ion-catalyzed reaction of a methacrylate (or acrylate) in the presence of a silyl ketene acetal gives a high molecular weight polymer (45—50). 

Cobalt complexes are used for the living radical polymerization of acrylates to give a high molecular weight polymer with a narrow molecular weight distribution (Mw/Mn 1.2) (Eq. 71), whereas the complex is applied to the introduction of an unsaturated group into the methacrylate polymers with a high efficiency via a reaction mechanism illustrated in Eq. (72) [27,28,267,268]. 

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