Living copolymerization of mixed
monomers can enrich the diversity
of copolymer materials with well-defined performance via controlling
both monomers and stereosequences. However, periodic sequence-controlled
living copolymerization of same-type monomers with more than two components
in synthetic polymer science remains a challenge. In this work, a
new method of monomer-promoting asymmetric kinetic resolution-alternating
copolymerization can let a tricomponent mixture of l-lactide
(S,S-LA or l-LA) and two enantiomeric isomers
of racemic tropic acid cyclic esters (tropicolactone) be polymerized
into sequence-controlled −(ASASBS)
n
– type biodegradable
copolyesters (the subscript S presents the configuration and A and
B present lactic acid units and tropic acid units, respectively),
and diblock copolymers of −(ASASBS)
n
-b-(ARARBR)
n
–
can further be obtained upon addition of R,R-LA (d
-LA). Compared to previous asymmetric kinetic
resolutions of racemic chemicals via polymerization or organic reactions,
no enantiopure catalyst/initiator is required in this system. After
the resolution and alternating copolymerization of S,S-LA and rac-tropicolactone, the ee value of unreacted
tropicolactone can reach 99.4%. The alternating probability between
tropicolactone and lactide monomers is more than 96% in periodic sequence
polymers of −(ASASBS)
n
–. The tetracomponent mixture of rac-lactide and rac-tropicolactone can
be copolymerized into an alternating copolymer with a −((ASASBS)
x
-ran-(ARARBR)
y
)
n
– structure,
in which the stereoselective linkage probability of 95% after S,S-lactide (R,R-lactide) followed by S-tropicolactone
(R-tropicolactone) keeps very high too.