Polymerization by oxidation coupling. I. A study of the oxidation of 2,6‐diphenylphenol to poly(2,6‐diphenyl‐1,4‐phenylene ether)

Abstract The synthesis of poly(2,6‐diphenyl‐1,4‐phenylene ether), by the oxidative coupling of 2,6‐diphenylphenol has been studied. Procedures were found which demonstrated that polymers of very high molecular weight \documentclass{article}\pagestyle{empty}\begin{document}$ \left( {\overline M _n > 200{\rm 000; }\left[ \eta \right]_{{\rm CHCl}_{\rm 3} }^{25^\circ {\rm C}} > 1.1{\rm }{{{\rm dl}} \mathord{\left/ {\vphantom {{{\rm dl}} g}} \right. \kern-\nulldelimiterspace} g}} \right) $\end{document} could be made with a copper‐amine catalyst system. A low nitrogen‐to‐copper ratio (1 N atom/Cu atom) was necessary to obtain the very high molecular weights under the conditions of these reactions. A variety of amines formed active catalysts; the effectiveness of mono‐ and bis‐ primary, secondary, and tertiary amines were compared. Effects of the type of copper halide, reaction temperature, desiccants, addition rates of 2,6‐di‐phenylphenol, and solvents were also examined. Samples of polymer were isolated at different times during the polymerization. Measurements of viscosity, osmotic pressure, light scattering, gel permeation, phenolic hydroxyl groups, and nitrogen content were made on various samples over a range of intrinsic viscosities of 0.05–0.59 dl/g. A very narrow molecular weight distribution was found for all samples. Hydroxyl endgroup analyses indicated that the concentration of phenolic endgroups per mole of polymer does not change during the polymerization. The presence of some side reactions is indicated by nitrogen analyses. The relationships between the intrinsic viscosity in chloroform at 25°C and M̄ n and M̄ w are: log [η] = −3.97 + 0.72 7 log M̄ n and log [ n ] = −3.56 + 0.62 4 log M̄ w .