Synthesis and Characterisation of Epoxy End-capped Polystyrene Oligomers

The living poly(styryl)lithium precursor was formed by anionic polymerisation with the protection of argon under ambient condition, where styrene, cyclohexane, THF and nbutyllithium were used as monomer, solvent, polar reagent and initiator respectively. Then epoxy end-capped polystyrene oligomer was prepared by termination reaction of the poly(styryl)lithium with epichlorohydrin (ECH) over anhydrous aluminum chloride (or silver nitrate) as additive. The oligomer was characterised by GPC, FT-IR, {1}H-NMR and Hydrochloric acid-Dioxane Argentimetric method. The effects of aluminum chlorate and silver nitrate, termination temperature and time on the content of end epoxy group were also studied. The results show that the termination efficiency improved with the addition of aluminum chlorate and the decreasing of termination temperature. It is also found that the best termination temperature is 0 C and the best termination time is 1 h.