Controlled anionic synthesis of star‐shaped polystyrene by the incremental addition of divinylbenzene

Abstract

Star polystyrenes were synthesized from polystyryllithium with an incremental procedure in which equally divided portions of divinylbenzene (DVB) were added periodically. When the addition of DVB was repeated, the content of the unreacted polystyryllithium dramatically decreased, and complete conversion was readily achieved. In the conventional linking reaction, however, in which all the required amounts of DVB were added at once, there was an incomplete conversion of the arm polymer. The arm number of star polymers also continuously increased upon the subsequent addition of DVB. The incremental‐addition method effectively synthesized star polystyrene, minimizing uncoupled polystyrene and reproducibly controlling the arm number of star polystyrene without the formation of gel polymers. The intrinsic viscosity of star polystyrene was measured to determine the highly branched structure of star polystyrene prepared by incremental or one‐shot addition. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 43: 870–878, 2005

Polystyrene star‐shaped polymers containing core built from diepoxides

“…Similar procedure with the incremental addition of DVB was previously reported in the synthesis of star‐shaped polystyrenes 26. The method allowed to obtain star polymers with low D M and almost complete conversion of linear PS.…”

Kinetic Analysis of the Amphiphilic Star Block Copolymerization

“…Two general synthetic methods have been developed to prepare star polymers. One is the arm‐first method, in which reactive linear polymers are coupled with a multifunctional reagent 49–51. The other is the core‐first method, in which a multifunctional initiator is used to initiate the polymerization of monomers to form a multiarm star polymer 52, 53.…”

Synthesis of a novel star polymer consisting of a dendritic polyamidoamine core and polystyrene arms and its self‐assembly to form large multimolecular micelles

“…Two general synthetic methods have been developed to prepare star polymers. One is the so‐called arm‐first method, in which reactive linear polymers are coupled with a multifunctional reagent 4–10. The other is the so‐called core‐first method, in which a multifunctional initiator is used to initiate the polymerization of a monomer to form a multiarm star polymer 11–13.…”