Enhancing Responsibility

Thiol‐Mediated Chain Transfer as a Tool to Improve the Toughness of Acrylate Photo‐Crosslinked Poly(ε‐caprolactone)

“…It has been described that early gelation in the case of the radical chain growth photo-polymerization of acrylates results in heterogeneous matrices with regard to crosslink density (i.e., the distribution of crosslinks within the network). [25,31] Conversely, thiol-ene polymerization leads to the formation of highly uniform, crosslinked networks, characterized by narrow DMA tan 𝛿 peaks. [32][33][34] Extensive work by Cramer and Bowman et al, as well as by Trenton et al, has shown that incorporation of thiols into the acrylate photo-polymerization shifts the radical chain growth polymerization to a combination of radical step and chain growth polymerization.…”