Atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) has become one of the most implemented methods for polymer synthesis, owing to impressive control over polymer composition and associated properties. However, contamination of the polymer by the metal catalyst remains a major limitation. Organic ATRP photoredox catalysts have been sought to address this difficult challenge but have not achieved the precision performance of metal catalysts. Here, we introduce diaryl dihydrophenazines, identified through computationally directed discovery, as a class of strongly reducing photoredox catalysts. These catalysts achieve high initiator efficiencies through activation by visible light to synthesize polymers with tunable molecular weights and low dispersities.

A novel type of ionic covalent organic framework (ICOF), which contains sp(3)  hybridized boron anionic centers and tunable countercations, was constructed by formation of spiroborate linkages. These ICOFs exhibit high BET surface areas up to 1259 m(2)  g(-1) and adsorb a significant amount of H2 (up to 3.11 wt %, 77 K, 1 bar) and CH4 (up to 4.62 wt %, 273 K, 1 bar). Importantly, the materials show good thermal stabilities and excellent resistance to hydrolysis, remaining nearly intact when immersed in water or basic solution for two days. The presence of permanently immobilized ion centers in ICOFs enables the transportation of lithium ions with room-temperature lithium-ion conductivity of 3.05×10(-5)  S cm(-1) and an average Li(+) transference number value of 0.80±0.02. Our approach thus provides a convenient route to highly stable COFs with ionic linkages, which can potentially serve as absorbents for alternative energy sources such as H2, CH4, and also as solid lithium electrolytes/separators for the next-generation lithium batteries.

Photoredox catalysis is a versatile approach for the construction of challenging covalent bonds under mild reaction conditions, commonly using photoredox catalysts (PCs) derived from precious metals. As such, there is need to develop organic analogues as sustainable replacements. Although several organic PCs have been introduced, there remains a lack of strongly reducing visible light organic PCs. Herein, we establish the critical photophysical and electrochemical characteristics of both a dihydrophenazine and a phenoxazine system that enables them success as strongly reducing visible light PCs for trifluoromethylations and dual photoredox/nickel catalyzed C-N and C-S cross-couplings, reactions which have been historically exclusive to precious metal PCs.

Covalent organic frameworks with high porosity and crystallinity have been synthesized, through macrocycle-to-framework strategy, using shape-persistent arylene-ethynylene macrocycles as the key components to control the topology and modulate the porosity.