Macromolecular Rapid Communications, Vol.34, No.7, 568-573, 2013
Boron Subphthalocyanine Polymers by Facile Coupling to Poly(acrylic acid-ran-styrene) Copolymers Synthesized by Nitroxide-Mediated Polymerization and the Associated Problems with Autoinitiation
Boron subphthalocyanines (BsubPcs) are macrocyclic aromatic small molecules containing a chelated boron atom. BsubPcs have interesting optoelectronic and physical properties, justifying their use in various organic electronic devices such as organic solar cells and organic light-emitting diodes. However, our group has only recently reported the first incorporation of a BsubPc moiety into a polymer using a two-step post-polymerization procedure. This communication outlines the use of acrylic acid as a method for obtaining carboxylic acid functional copolymers for the facile coupling to BsubPc post polymerization. In addition, the observations and the proposed mechanism of a side product unique to the copolymerization of acrylic acid and styrene due to autoinitiation are presented.
Keywords:acrylic acid;autoinitiation;boron;carboxylic;functionalization;nitroxide-mediated polymerization;polyphthalocyanines;polystyrene;suphthalocyanine