Heterodinuclear zinc and magnesium catalysts for epoxide/CO₂ ring opening copolymerizations.

ABSTRACT: The ring-opening copolymerization of carbon dioxide and epoxides is a useful means to make aliphatic polycarbonates and to add-value to CO₂. Recently, the first heterodinuclear Zn(ii)/Mg(ii) catalyst showed greater activity than either homodinuclear analogue (J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2015, 137, 15078-15081). Building from this preliminary finding, here, eight new Zn(ii)/Mg(ii) heterodinuclear catalysts featuring carboxylate co-ligands are prepared and characterized. The best catalysts show very high activities for copolymerization using cyclohexene oxide (TOF = 8880 h^-1, 20 bar CO₂, 120 °C, 0.01 mol% catalyst loading) or cyclopentene oxide. All the catalysts are highly active in the low pressure regime and specifically at 1 bar pressure CO₂

SUBMITTER: Trott G 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6492632 | biostudies-literature | 2019 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature