Two-in-One: Photothermal Ring-Opening Copolymerization of CO and Epoxides.

A two-in-one strategy for the photothermal ring-opening copolymerization (PROCOP) of carbon dioxide (CO) and epoxides was developed by using visible light as an external stimulus. This strategy bridges two processes involving light-to-heat conversion and the alternating copolymerization of CO and epoxides. As a proof-of-concept, aluminum porphyrin complexes were explored as photothermal catalysts to afford the copolymerization of CO/epoxides under a 635 nm laser irradiation.

From Impossible to Possible: Atom-Economic Polymerization of Low Strain Five-Membered Carbonates.

The direct ring-opening polymerization (ROP) of propylene carbonate (PC) only affords oligomers with substantial unidentified by-products, which hinders the efficient utilization of PC. Through detailed studies, for the first time, a careful mechanism involving the in situ release of propylene oxide (PO) from PC decarboxylation is proposed. Further, we report a novel strategy of copolymerization of PC/cyclic anhydrides via in situ capture of the formed intermediates.