Enhancing Biopolyester Backbone Rigidity with an Asymmetric Furanic Monomer.

ABSTRACT: Biobased furanic polyesters can exhibit performance advantages over petroleum-derived polyesters, primarily due to their rigid furan-containing backbones. Herein, we develop two strategies to polymerize methyl 5-hydroxymethyl furanoate to poly-(5-hydroxymethyl furanoate) (PHMF), a furan-based polyester with even greater backbone rigidity than poly-(ethylene furanoate). Thermal, spectroscopic, and computational investigations of PHMF alongside analogous furan-based and phenyl-based polyesters suggest that the high furan content of PHMF leads to its high glass transition temperature, slow crystallization kinetics, and low amorphous mobility. Molecular dynamics simulations suggest that while the backbone of PHMF is exceptionally rigid, its amorphous phase is denser than its phenyl analog due

SUBMITTER: Woroch CP 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12541805 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature