Urethane polymers, syntheses

Zang, J.Y., Beckman, E.J., Piesco, N.P., and Agrawal, S., A new peptide-based urethane polymer synthesis, biodegradation, and potential to support cell growth in-vitro. Biomaterials 21 1247-1258, 2000. 

Although employed, at one time, primarily as a war gas, phosgene is now an important chemical intermediate for the synthesis of a large number of commercial materials. Worldwide, it is used mainly in the manufacture of isocyanates (for urethane polymers and organic intermediates), polycarbonates (for speciality polymers), and monomeric carbonates and chloroformates (largely for the synthesis of pharmaceuticals and pest control chemicals). The established large-scale, commercial applications of phosgene are summarized in Fig. 4.7. 

The foregoing relationships of chain length to extent of reaction would then be expected to apply to such step polymerizations as are involved in the synthesis of poly(alkylene sulfides) from a dihalide and sodium polysulfide (polycondensation) or in the formation of the urethane polymers from glycols and diisocyanates (polyaddition). The polysulfide reaction is actually carried out in a suspension of the dihalide in an aqueous solution of the polysulfide, using a surfactant to stabilize the resulting polymer suspension. 

In a preliminary study also involving model compounds [81], the kinetics of urethane formation was followed by FTIR spectroscopy using an aliphatic and an aromatic monoisocyanate and their homologous diisocyanates. Both the model reactions and the polymer synthesis gave clear cut second-order behaviour, indicating that the hydroxyl groups borne by the suberin monomers displayed conventional aliphatic-OH reactivity. 

It will be realized from Chapter 1 that in urethane elastomer formation from liquid components there is the possibility of several reactions occurring simultaneously during a prepolymer or one-shot process, and that the relative proportion of one to the other will affect the overall properties of the final polymer. Thermoplastic and millable urethanes are not, during their processing and fabrication stages, subjected to the type of catalysis discussed in this chapter during their polymer synthesis operations, however, reaction rate-structure considerations will apply. 

Polymer Synthesis and Characterization. Diamines or diols can be used as chain extenders in copolymerization reactions, but urea linkages formed from diamines often lead to polymer insolubility. Poor solubility is avoided by using diols, but this requires a two stage preparation (Scheme 1) because of the disparity in reactivity of alcohols and amines with isocyanates. To form urea and urethane linkages separately, the reaction between isophorone diisocyanate and benzene dimethanol was carried out first in bulk at 115 °C without catalyst (Equation 1). Secondly, reaction between aminopropyl endcapped dimethylsiloxane oligomers and diisocyanate intermediates was effected in THF at room temperature (Equation 2). Completion of the polymerization reaction was established by NMR and infrared spectroscopy. ... 

HydrophobicaHy Modified, Ethoxylated Urethane. HEUR associative thickeners are in effect poly(oxyethylene) polymers that contain terminal hydrophobe units (66). They can be synthesized via esterification with monoacids, tosylation reactions, or direct reaction with monoisocyanates. There are problems associated with aH of the methods of synthesis. The general commercial procedure for their synthesis is by a step-growth addition of... 

Practical methods for synthesis and elucidation of the optimum physical forms were developed at Du Pont (13). The violets fill the void in the color gamut when the inorganics are inadequate. The quinacridones may be used in most resins except polymers such as nylon-6,6, polystyrene, and ABS. They are stable up to 275°C and show excellent weatherabiUty. One use is to shade phthalocyanines to match Indanthrone Blue. In carpeting, the quinacridones are recommended for polypropylene, acrylonitrile, polyester, and nylon-6 filaments. Predispersions in plastici2ers ate used in thermoset polyesters, urethanes, and epoxy resins (14). 

The chain extension step may then take place in the water phase. Hydrazine and ethylene diamine are commonly used chain extenders for waterborne urethane dispersions. The isocyanates react with the diamine chain extenders much faster than with the water, thus forming polyurea linkages and building a high molecular weight polymer. More detailed information regarding the synthesis and process of making waterborne polyurethane dispersions is found in Dieterich s review article [58]. 

Synthesis of hydrolytically stable siloxane-urethanes by the melt reaction of organo-hydroxy terminated siloxane oligomers with various diisocyanates have been reported i97,i98) -yhg polymers obtained by this route are reported to be soluble in cresol and displayed rubber-like properties. However the molecular weights obtained were not very high. A later report56) described the use of hydroxybutyl terminated disiloxanes in the synthesis of poly(urethane-siloxanes). No data on the characterization of the copolymers have been given. However, from our independent kinetic and synthetic studies on the same system 199), unfortunately, it is clear that these types of materials do not result in well defined multiphase copolymers. The use of low molecular weight hydroxypropyl-terminated siloxanes in the synthesis of siloxane-urethane type structures has also been reported 198). 

Ishihara K, Hanyuda H, and Nakabayashi N. Synthesis of phospholipids polymers having a urethane bond in the side chain as coating material on segmented polyurethane and their platelet adhesion resistant properties. Biomaterials, 1995, 16(11), 873-879. 

The anionic method of polymerization is most useful for the synthesis of low molecular weight hydroxy-terminated oligomers and polymers that are to be further processed. For example, the treatment of hydroxy-terminated oligomers with isocyanates has been used to obtain polyester-urethanes (9,20), while triblock copolymers (PCL-PEG-PCL) are prepared by initiating the polymerization of e-caprolactone with the disodium alcoholate from polyethylene glycol (26). 

Many of the common condensation polymers are listed in Table 1-1. In all instances the polymerization reactions shown are those proceeding by the step polymerization mechanism. This chapter will consider the characteristics of step polymerization in detail. The synthesis of condensation polymers by ring-opening polymerization will be subsequently treated in Chap. 7. A number of different chemical reactions may be used to synthesize polymeric materials by step polymerization. These include esterification, amidation, the formation of urethanes, aromatic substitution, and others. Polymerization usually proceeds by the reactions between two different functional groups, for example, hydroxyl and carboxyl groups, or isocyanate and hydroxyl groups. 

For example, 2-bromoquinuclidine (80) does not form Grignard reagents and 2-aminoquinuclidine is so unstable that on hydrolysis of its urethans (81) under mild conditions ammonia is lost and polymers of dehydroquinuclidine are formed. The synthesis of 2-bromoquinuclidine (80) was achieved by the Borodin reaction,90 and the urethans (81) were obtained from quinuclidine-2-carboxhydrazide (82) by the Curtius reactions.142 The Curtius reaction with quinucli-dine-4-carboxylic acid derivatives gave 4-aminoquinuclidine (83).143 This compound (83) was also synthesized directly from quinuclidine-4-carboxylic acid by the Schmidt reaction. However, the first method is better, in spite of having more steps. 

F. Bachmann, M. Ruppenstein, and J. Thiem, Synthesis of aminosaccharide-derived polymers with urea, urethane, and amide linkages, J. Polym. Sci. Part A Polym. Chem., 39 (2001) 2332-2341. 

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