Carbon dioxide copolymers: Emerging sustainable materials for versatile applications

Abstract

Carbon dioxide (CO 2) is cheap, renewable, abundant, and nontoxic carbon feedstocks in chemical reactions. In the past two decades, utilization of CO 2 in polymer science has become a meaningful topic bridging two separate subjects, namely CO 2 valorization and sustainable polymer synthesis. This review summarizes the recent progress in CO 2 copolymer materials from synthesis to material performance adjustment, focusing on commercialized or potential commodity sustainable materials such as biodegradable polycarbonates and new structure polyurethanes from CO 2-polyol building blocks.

Polymeric Materials Based on Carbon Dioxide: A Brief Review of Studies Carried Out at the Faculty of Chemistry, Warsaw University of Technology

“…Carbon dioxide is an ideal raw material for chemical synthesis, as it is a rather safe, cheap, renewable, and abundant compound. There are a number of processes in which CO 2 can be used directly as a comonomer in chain polymerization processes or as one of the reactants involved in polymer synthesis by multi-step procedures [84]. They include traditional technologies where CO 2 is employed in the synthesis of urea or formaldehyde, as well as the emerging ones based on reactions of CO 2 with heterocyclic compounds.…”

Organocatalytic selective coupling of episulfides with carbon disulfide for the synthesis of poly(trithiocarbonate)s and cyclic trithiocarbonates

“…Unlike polycarbonates that can be chemically degraded or depolymerized only under anionic or enzymatic conditions, 44,45 poly(trithiocarbonate)s are vulnerable to…”

Advancing the Development of Recyclable Aromatic Polyesters by Functionalization and Stereocomplexation

“…For example, alternating copolymerization of epoxides with carbon dioxide or cyclic anhydrides enables the synthesis of well-defined polycarbonates or polyesters with abundant functional groups and tunable properties. [57][58][59][60][61][62][63][64][65][66][67][68][69][70] However, this strategy is still facing many challenges such as low catalytic activity, limited molecular weight products, and undesirable side reactions. In this work, we proposed to take advantage of epoxides to construct a series of seven-membered aromatic monomers with stereo-defined and diverse functionalities towards highperformance recyclable aromatic polymers.…”

“…The abundance of functionalities and the accuracy of stereochemistry prompted epoxides to be an excellent building block for introducing diverse functionalities and well‐defined stereocenters into materials. For example, alternating copolymerization of epoxides with carbon dioxide or cyclic anhydrides enables the synthesis of well‐defined polycarbonates or polyesters with abundant functional groups and tunable properties [57–70] . However, this strategy is still facing many challenges such as low catalytic activity, limited molecular weight products, and undesirable side reactions.…”