Polyacetylenes degradation

An interesting example of regioselective CM with ethylene as a tool in natural product degradation was recently disclosed by Hawaiian authors [149]. Thus, CM using catalyst C and ethylene gas was used to degrade the plant polyacetylene oxylipin (+)-falcarindiol (342) with uncertain stereochemistry at C3. As the reaction provided a meso product (343) in 81% yield by regioselective attack at the aliphatic side chain, the natural compound 342, isolated from a Hawaiian endemic plant, had the 3R,8S configuration shown in Scheme 66. 

Although it was initially believed that polyacetylene was unstable in contact with water under all conditions, it has been successfully chemically doped in aqueous solutions with no apparent degradation of the material [82] and its electrochemistry has also been investigated [135-137] from which it is clear that no degradation occurs in concentrated aqueous electrolytes. Reaction with water can occur under some circumstances however giving rise to sp3 carbons and carbonyl-type structures [129, 138-141],... 

Porif.> (hydro)pyrimidine, macroQ clic and oligomeric pyridine or pyridinium, naphthyridine, oxazole, pteridine, pyridoacridine, pyrrole, pyrroloimiiMquinone, (oxa)quinoli2idine, terpenoid indolizidine. ISOPR. Monotero. rare Sesouitem. . Ditero.. Sestertero. also degraded C>i Tritero.. POLYKET. macrolides, polyacetylenes, polycyclic (hydro)quinones, polyethers, (epidioxy)polyp ionates. ... 

Fig. 21. Doping and subsequent degradation of polyacetylene by oxygen. (7 pm film, 50 °C, 600 Torr Oxygen) (Ref.515))...

In spite of the obvious importance of polymer stability in any potential applications of conducting polymers, there have been remarkably few systematic studies of degradation of polymers other than polyacetylene. Partly this may be due to an understandable reluctance of those involved in research on these materials to find that they are not stable and partly it is due to the difficulty of preparing samples in appropriate film forms for study. Another problem of discussing stability in conducting polymers is that there is no absolute standard for a stable material. For some applications an... 

Pron et al.569) looked at polyacetylene treated from the gas phase with H2S04 which leads to HS04 counter-ions. They found that the conductivity drops in air with the appearance of C=O bands in the ir, although the rate of decay is much lower than would be expected for undoped samples. The polymer was more rapidly degraded by exposure to water but could be redoped with further acid treatment. Pron et al.570) have also reported hydrolytic instability in polyacetylene with A1C14 as the counterion. In both cases the proposed mechanism involves addition of OH" to the chain and keto-enol tautomerism to form carbonyl groups. 

As discussed earlier, substitution onto the polyacetylene chain invariably has a deleterious effect on dopability and conduction properties. At the same time the stability tends to improve. Masuda et al.583) studied a large range of substituted polyacetylenes and found that stability increased with the number and bulkiness of the substituents, so that the polymers of aromatic disubstituted acetylenes were very stable, showing no reaction with air after 20 h at 160 °C. Unfortunately, none of these polymers is conducting. Deitz et al.584) studied copolymers of acetylene and phenylacetylene they found that poly(phenylacetylene) degrades even more rapidly than does polyacetylene and that the behaviour of copolymers is intermediate. Encapsulation of the iodine-doped polymers had little effect on the degradation, which is presumably at least in part due to iodination of the chain. 

Pochan et al. 585) have studied poly(l,6-heptadiyne), a polyacetylene analogue, which forms dense continuous films. They find oxygen doping follwed by degradation in a manner similar to polyacetylene, except that the rate of degradation is much larger. 

In considering the potential applications of electroactive polymers, the question always arises as to their stability. The deterioration of a physical property such as conductivity can be easily measured, but the chemical processes underlying it are not as easy to be revealed. In order to understand them, XPS has been used to follow the structural changes which occur in the polymer chain and the counter-ions of the doped polymer. The following sections present some XPS findings on the degradation of electroactive polymers, such as polyacetylene, polypyrrole, polythiophene and polyaniline, in the undoped and doped states. 

Commercial use of "doped" polyacetylene electrochemical cells failed because of their air sensitivity and a long-term chemical degradation, which limited their shelf life to about six months this progressive degradation and color change of some conducting polymers was instead used as a tag to monitor the age of products with limited shelf life ... 

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