Designing phase selective soluble polymers for applications in organic chemistry

Abstract

Soluble polymers as supports are gaining more attention now. Developing new polymers, new reagents and catalysts, new separation systems are thus of great interest as these sorts of materials' applications in synthesis and catalysis increase. The work described in the succeeding chapters describes my efforts to synthesize new catalysts that can be attached to polymer supports, to study their catalytic activity and to study separation efficiency. Most of the work focus is on polyacrylamide polymers. Both organometallic catalysts and organic catalysts have been studied. Liquid/liquid separation was the technique mainly investigated. In addition, a new separation scheme called latent biphasic system which is a new liquid/liquid separation method is described. Finally, studies with the Cremer group where the LCST behavior of polyacrylamides was studied using dark field methods are also discussed.