Abstract:
As an abundant, nontoxic and inexpensive one-carbon (C1) feedstock, carbon dioxide (CO
2) has been used as the monomer for preparing a variety of polymers via copolymerization process, such as polycarbonates, poly(urethane)s and polyureas that are linear chain structure. Due to the limit in designing multi-functionalized comonomers, using CO
2 to synthesize polymers with different architectures, such as hyperbranched polymers (HBPs), is rarely reported. Recently, Qin and Tang
et al. have reported a successful synthesis of CO
2-based hyperbranched poly(alkynoate)s (
hb-PAs) via three-component polymerization of CO
2, multi-functionalized alkyne and dihalides under mild conditions. The resultant polymer possessed two types of ethynyl groups with different reactivities towards the same types of amines, so it could undergo site-selective, multi-step functionalizations. Taking advantage of this facile and efficient site-selective functionalization strategy, they prepared a hyperbranched polyprodrug amphiphile with high drug loading content, an artificial light-harvesting system with high energy transfer efficiency and pure white light-emitting polymeric materials. This work provides a new method to convert CO
2 into multifunctional HBPs that are platform polymers for diverse functionalizations.