“…Nickel salts are well-known to cyclotrimerize, cyclotetramerize, and to polymerize acetylene, producing benzene, cyclooctatetraene, and amorphous presumably low molecular weight poly(acetylene). − Recently, there have been several reports of the polymerization of acetylene derivatives using late-transition-metal catalysts based on rhodium, − palladium, and nickel. − Late-transition-metal catalysts are particularly attractive as they tend to exhibit greater functional group tolerance than the more electron-deficient early-transition-metal catalysts. To our knowledge, these catalysts have not been applied to the synthesis of poly(cyanoacetylene).…”