Abstract:

To obtain well-defined structures of α-cyclodextrin (α-CD) based monomer and its hyperbranehed polymer (HBP), a modified α-CD molecule with one electron-rich alkene and many electron-poor acrylates was first prepared through the esterification reaction between mono-ester undecylenic acid-α-CD and acrylic acid. It was then utilized as an AB_n-type monomer for subsequent ADMET polymerization between alkene and acrylate using the second generation Hoveyda-Grubbs catalyst in homogeneous water/organic [D₂O/(CD₃)₂CO] mixtures via acyclic diene metathesis (ADMET) polymerization. A novel cyclodextrin-based HBP was obtained in prolonged reaction time. The monomer and HBP were characterized by NMR, elemental analysis, FTIR, and MALDI-TOF MS measurements. It was found that the actual molecular structures of both monomer and polymer were identical with the designed structures. The produced polymers have molecular weights within 13.2 and 56.3 kDa, and their polydispersity indices range from 2.78 to 2.63 by multiangle laser light scattering-gel permeation chromatography. The degree of branching was determined by ¹H NMR spectroscopy and the values ranges from 0.41 to 0.52.