| The synthesis of homopolymers and block copolymers containing metal coordinating ligands is an important area of research due to the potential applications of these polymers in the fields of optics, electronics, and photonics. Specifically, the terpyridine group is very useful, since it can act as a tridentate chelating ligand due to its strategically positioned, three nitrogen atoms. This allows it to form strong complexes with a variety of transition metal ions.;The hydroxyl functionality is another important group due to numerous applications of well-defined hydroxyl-functionalized polymers. They can react with other functional groups on other polymers for chain extension, branching, or crosslinking. They can also be used as macroinitiators for the polymerization of other monomers such as lactide and lactone.;Alkyllithium-initiated, living anionic polymerization offers excellent control over molecular weight and molecular weight distribution. The absence of termination and chain transfer steps makes these systems ideally suited for the preparation of chain-end functionalized polymers by the reaction of the living chain ends with appropriate monomers or terminating agents. A recently reported general anionic functionalization method was used to create well-defined terpyridine and hydroxyl end-functionalized polymers. In the first step, living polymeric organolithium compounds were reacted with silyl chlorides to form the corresponding silyl hydride-functionalized polymers. Then, these polymers were reacted with substituted alkenes in the presence of a hydrosilation catalyst to form the corresponding functionalized polymers. A new method was also developed, based on similar chemistry, to prepare an in-chain functionalized diblock copolymer where a variety of functional groups can be placed directly at the interface of the two blocks. This method was used to prepare both in-chain hydroxyl- and terpyridine-functionalized polystyrene-b-polyisoprene copolymers.;Lewis bases effect dramatic changes in microstructure, initiation rates, propagation rates and monomer reactivity ratios for alkyllithium-initiated polymerizations of vinyl monomers in hydrocarbon solution. The stability of polymeric organolithium compounds and the mechanism of decomposition in the presence of various stoichiometric equivalents of tetrahydrofuran in benzene solutions were studied due the importance of THF as an additive. |
