GOALI, SusChem: Organocatalysis for Sustainable Polymer Chemistry

在这个由化学系大分子、超分子和纳米化学项目资助的项目中，斯坦福大学的Robert Waymouth与IBM的James赫德里克博士合作，将开发新的催化剂和催化方法，用于从可再生资源中生产可生物降解的材料和塑料。 该研究将侧重于开发环境友好的有机催化剂，用于合成新的功能低聚物，聚合物和大分子组装体。 这些材料的目标是作为石油化工衍生塑料的替代品，并作为生物医学应用的生物可降解材料的新家族。 两性离子开环聚合的机理和合成研究将进行产生大的环状大分子-一类材料，仍然知之甚少的结果，缺乏合成方法来产生大的环状大分子。一种新的环状聚合物合成方法的发现也为研究聚合物科学中最基本的问题之一提供了机会，特别是端基和聚合物拓扑结构对高分子材料性能的影响。 补充工作将侧重于开发新的战略，用于合成可生物降解的聚酯，聚酰胺，聚（磷酸酯）和聚氨酯及其组装成生物相容性材料。 更广泛的影响包括可持续聚合物/塑料的潜在社会效益，通过学术界与行业的合作为项目参与者提供了一个良好的培训基地，并参与了当地高中教师的推广计划。新的合成方法推动了聚合物化学和材料科学的创新。 开发物理性能与现有石油基塑料具有竞争力但环境足迹小于现有材料的可再生材料是一个巨大的挑战。 本研究旨在通过开发有机催化剂和引发剂来应对这些挑战，这些催化剂和引发剂是聚合物合成中基于金属的策略的环保替代品。 该计划提供了斯坦福大学和IBM Almaden实验室之间的学术/工业合作模式，将推进聚合物合成的新策略，并为聚酯热塑性塑料的聚合和回收创造新技术，可再生塑料的产生和用于生物医学应用的新功能材料。

In this project funded by the Macromolecular, Supramolecular and Nanochemistry Program of the Chemistry Division, Robert Waymouth of Stanford University, in collaboration with Dr. James Hedrick of IBM, will develop new catalysts and catalytic methods for the generation of biodegradable materials and plastics from renewable resources. The research will focus on the development of environmentally benign organic catalysts for the synthesis of new families of functional oligomers, polymers and macromolecular assemblies. These materials are targeted as alternatives to petrochemically-derived plastics and as new families of biodegradable materials for biomedical applications. Mechanistic and synthetic investigations of zwitterionic ring-opening polymerization will be carried out to generate large cyclic macromolecules - a class of materials that remain poorly understood as a consequence of the paucity of synthetic methods to generate large ring macromolecules. The discovery of a new synthetic method for the generation of cyclic polymers also provides an opportunity to investigate one of the most basic problems in polymer science, notably the influence of endgroups and polymer topology on the properties of macromolecular materials. Complementary efforts will focus on the development of new strategies for the synthesis of biodegradable polyesters, polyamides, poly(phosphoesters) and polyurethanes and their assembly into biocompatible materials. The broader impacts involve the potential societal benefits of sustainable polymers / plastics, providing an excellent training ground for project participants via an academic-industry collaboration, and participation in an outreach program to local high school teachers.New synthetic methods drive innovation in polymer chemistry and materials science. The development of renewable materials whose physical properties are competitive with existing petroleum based plastics, but whose environmental footprint is smaller than that of existing materials is a grand challenge. This research seeks to meet these challenges with the development of organic catalysts and initiators as environmentally attractive alternatives to metal-based strategies for polymer synthesis. This program provides a model collaborative academic / industrial collaboration between Stanford and IBM Almaden Laboratories that will advance new strategies in polymer synthesis and create new technologies for polymerization and recycling of polyester thermoplastics, the generation of renewable plastics and new functional materials for biomedical applications.