Elemental sulfur‐based polymeric materials: Synthesis and characterization

Abstract

New elemental sulfur-based polymeric materials called poly(sulfur-random-divinylbenzene) [poly(S-r-DVB)] were synthesized by ring opening polymerization via inverse vulcanization technique in the presence of a mixture of o-, m-, and p-diviniylbenzene (DVB) as a cross-linker. A clear yellow/orange colored liquid was obtained from the elemental sulfur melted at 160 8C and then by adding various amounts of DVB to this liquid directly via a syringe at 200 8C viscous reddish brown polymeric materials were obtained. The copolymers are soluble in common solvents like tetrahydrofuran, dichloromethane, and chloroform, and they can be coated on any surface as a thin film by a spray coating technique. The characterization of the materials was performed by using nuclear magnetic resonance, fourier transform infrared, and Raman spectroscopies. The morphological properties were monitored via scanning electron microscope technique. Thermal analysis showed that an increase in the amount of DVB in the copolymers resulted in an increase in the thermal decomposition temperature. On the other hand, poly(S-r-DVB) copolymers exhibited good percent transmittance as 50% T between 1500 and 13,000 nm in electromagnetic radiation spectrum, which makes them good candidates to be amenable use in military and surveillance cameras.

Sustainable inverse-vulcanised sulfur polymers

“…Recently there has been a surge of further reports of other inverse vulcanised polymers using a variety of crosslinkers. 4,[14][15][16][17][18][19] Although these new materials have made progress in improving the applications of sulfur materials, there are still issues to be addressed, such as molecular weight 14,15 and cost. The cost can be attributed to either the crosslinker used 19 or requiring multistep synthesis, 17,18 when compared to simpler one-pot syntheses reported for commercially available crosslinkers.…”

Electrochemical activity of sulfur networks synthesized through RAFT polymerization

“…31 and 32 using different approaches. Moreover, other applications of S networks are currently being reported in the scientific community, namely the synthesis of high refractive index materials 38 or heavy metals sorbents. 39,40 Within these latter classes of materials, increasing of the processability and/or functionalization to improve the sorption capability are achievements that can be further explored with RAFT polymerization.…”

Green chemistry and polymers made from sulfur

“…Pyun and associates showed, for instance, that inverse vulcanisation using triene 2, provides a polysulfide with improved thermomechanical properties in the form of a higher glass transition temperature (over 100°C) than the first generation poly(S-r-DIB) which possessed a T g of 43-49°C. 54 In other studies, inverse vulcanisation with divinylbenzene (DVB, 3), [56][57][58] styrene (4), 46 and α-methylstyrene (5), 59 demonstrated that traditional and widely available monomers for radical polymerisation can also be converted into polysulfides. In the case of DVB, the synthesis of the corresponding polysulfides was informed by early studies in the Pyun laboratory in 2011 when sulfur was used as a reaction medium to prepare gold nanoparticles and related composites.…”

“…In this prescient study, sulfur was cross-linked with DVB. 60 The more recent DVB polysulfides, prepared by inverse vulcanisation, could be fashioned into a highly IR transparent thin film, 56 or used as a cathode material for Li-S batteries. 58 The co-polymerisation of sulfur, DVB, and bis-maleimide 6 also provided a novel cathode material for Li-S cells.…”