Macromolecules, Vol.42, No.19, 7360-7366, 2009
Single-Electron Transfer Living Radical Polymerization (SET-LRP) of Methyl Methacrylate (MMA) with a Typical RAFT Agent as an Initiator
A typical reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) agent, 2-cyanoprop-2-yl 1-dithionaphthalate (CPDN), was used as a single electron transfer-living radical polymerization (SET-LRP) initiator for methyl methacrylate (NIMA) polymerization at 25 degrees C. At 1:1 molar ratio of [CPDN](0)/[Cu(O)](0), the apparent rate constants of propagation (k(p)(app)) were 0.037, 0.049, and 0.072 h(-1) for [MMA](0)/[CPDN](0) of 225/0.2, 225/0.5, and 225/1, respectively. The number-average molecular weight of poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) increased linearly with monomer conversion, and narrow molecular weight distributions (M-w/M-n < 1.50) were found at most cases. At high molar ratio of [CPDN](0) to [Cu(0)](0), such as 1:0.1 in this work, the polymerization was also controllable, whereas it a presented markedly depressed polymerization rate and an obvious induction period. H-1 NMR spectroscope and matrix assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry confirmed that PMMA chain was end-capped by CPDN species with high fidelity. The tacticity of PMMA from H-1 NMR calculation was about 3.15% isotactic (mm), 29.65% atactic (mr) and 67.20% syndiotactic (rr) triads, consistent with the tacticity distribution for traditional radical polymerizations. Chain extension reactions substantiated further that the obtained PMMA from CPDN mediated SET-LRT was living, and can be, and can be reactivated for chain extension reaction. This work demonstrates that a typical RAFT agent can act as a SET-LRP initiator as well as an atom transfer radical polymerization initiator. Furthermore, these results also suggested that the single electron transfer initiation-reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer control (SET-RAFT) invented by Dhamodharan may not be RAFT at all, but rather SET-LRP initiated by a RAFT reagent, or a combination of SET-LRP and RAFT, Analogously, the exact polymerization process in this work may also proceed in two manners, a fully SET-LRP process and a combination of SET-LRP/RAFT process, which is needed to clarify in the future.