Coordination chemistry from monomers to copolymers

Abstract

Coordination polymers can often provide the best properties of both their organic and inorganic components, e.g. flexibility coupled with high thermal stability. Some of the coordination polymers that are discussed are stable to 500°C and yet provide sufficient flexibility to be studied like organic polymers. Whereas intractability has been the norm for metal coordination polymers in the past, examples of tractable (organic solvent-soluble) transition metal, inner transition metal, and main group metal ion coordination polymers are now known. Syntheses of linear metal coordination polymers through functionalized metal coordination monomers copolymerized with polymerization reactions on the organic part of the molecules often provide higher molecular weight species than syntheses using metal salts plus bridging ligands, i.e. a higher extent of reaction often occurs in the polymerization reactions, although examples of virtually complete substitution of bridging ligands for simpler ligands of simple coordination compounds do exist. Also, coordination polymers also provide unique opportunities for end-capping reactions that can provide definitive molecular weight information and/or modify the properties of the polymers.