Homopolymers polyferrocenylsilanes

Tang and coworkers have reported that pyrolyzed hyperbranched polyferro-cenylsilanes have greater ceramic yields than their linear polymeric counterparts. Manners has reported that thermally crosslinked polyferrocenylsilanes (28) possessed greater thermal stability than their linear analogs. The swelling properties of these crosslinked polymers were examined, and the solubility parameter of the corresponding linear homopolymer was determined. The pyrolysis of linear, hyperbranched, and crosslinked polyferrocenylsilanes has resulted in the production of ceramics that possess magnetic properties. " ... 

This chapter focuses on polyferrocenylsilanes (PFSs) where iron and silicon are in the main chain. Subsequently, PFS block copolymers will be reviewed. These materials represent an area of rapidly growing interest as a result of their self-assembly into phase-separated metal-rich nanodomain structures in thin films and micelles in block-selective solvents. The resulting nanostructured materials have a wealth of potential applications and recent breakthroughs in this area are discussed. The subject matter of the chapter is divided up into subsections covering PFS homopolymer and block copolymer synthesis, solution and solid-state self-assembly and applications of the latter, which have been extensively developed by ourselves and our collaborators and also by other research groups. 

---