Biodegradable Copolymers Produced from Carbon Dioxide and Epoxides by Well-defined Metal Catalysts:Mechanistic and Technology Enabling Studies

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Professor Donald J. Darensbourg of Texas A & M University is supported by the Inorganic, Bioinorganic and Organometallic Chemistry program to explore the utilization of carbon dioxide as a reagent that can couple with epoxides to form biodegradable copolymers. Robust (salen)MX complexes with an array of cocatalysts will be used to probe mechanistic details of polymer kinetics including initiation, propagation and termination. Current routes to commercial polycarbonate materials employ phosgene, a hazardous CO source, so a greener and more benign technology for synthesizing these polymers would have important industrial implications. This research project addresses conversion of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, to useful copolymer products. Graduate students will be exposed to catalyst design, polymer chemistry and organometallic syntheses in this interdisciplinary research project. Outreach plans involve undergraduate and high school students in cutting edge organometallic chemical research relevant to environmental issues.