화학공학소재연구정보센터
Macromolecules, Vol.50, No.23, 9173-9187, 2017
Continuous Production of Multiblock Copolymers in a Loop Reactor: When Living Polymerization Meets Flow Chemistry
A continuous process for the production of multiblock polymers via living anionic polymerization in a loop reactor is proposed by kinetic modeling. The process utilizes specific configurations of the loop reactors and feed inlets, thus producing multiblock polymers constituted by a blend of chains with varying number of blocks. The dependence of the product molecular parameters, such as length, composition of each block, and the block number distribution, on the residence time and the recirculation fraction is analyzed by numerical integration of differential mass balances. This dependence is subsequently translated into controllability of molecular parameters by changing the operation conditions such as the recirculation and inlet flow rates. In general, higher recirculation flow rate yields products with shorter block length but larger fraction of polymers possessing higher number of blocks and more significant compositional mixing in each block. An increase in the feed flow rates also increases the compositional mixing but gives longer block length with lower fraction of polymers possessing a higher number of blocks. While being discussed in terms of living anionic copolymerization of styrene and butadiene, the present strategy can be extended to any other living copolymerization of suitable monomer pairs, thus highlighting the use of reaction engineering to control the polymer structures.