Synthesis of Aromatic Hyperbranched Polymer Based on Diphenolic Acid and Pentaerythritol: Reaction Kinetics Using FTIR Technique

Abstract

Hyperbranched polymers (HBPs) are a common type of soft nanomaterial, but creating them from readily available monomers with a well-defined dendritic structure is difficult. Advances in the quantitative description and control of hyperbranched fine topological structures will aid their development and application in a variety of fields, including traditional polymer materials and engineering as well as energy materials, and optoelectronic materials and devices. Using a sequential polycondensation technique based on commercially accessible monomers, we present a one-pot synthesis of aromatic HBP with configurable structure and high degree of branching. Generation 1 (G1) aromatic HBP (Ar.HBP) based on diphenolic acid and pentaerythritol has been synthesized in the presence of p-toluene sulfonic acid as catalyst. Kinetics reaction was monitored using FTIR spectroscopy. –C=O absorption band of ester was used to track the conversion of acid to ester. The reaction of Ar.HBP-G1 synthesis takes approximately 21 h for completion according to kinetic parameters computed from IR spectral data.