Temperature Affording Very Fast Reactions and Polymers with Very

ABSTRACT: An unusual synergistic effect between 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium hexafluorophosphate (BMIM-PF6) and dimeth-yl sulfoxide (DMSO) mixtures is reported for the supplemental activator and reducing agent atom transfer radical polymerization (SARA ATRP) of methyl acrylate (MA) using a catalytic system composed by sodium dithionate (Na2S2O4) and CuBr2/Me6TREN (Me6TREN: tris[2-(dimethylamino)ethyl]amine) at room temper-ature. To the best of our knowledge, the use of ionic liquids (IL) has never been reported for the SARA ATRP. The kinetic data obtained for a broad range of target molecular weights revealed very fast polymerization rates, low dispersity values (Đ < 1.05) and well-defined chain-end functionalities. Atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) is one themost efficient, versatile and robust reversible deactivation radical polymerization (RDRP) techniques.1 This method allows the synthesis of polymers having a vast range of specific functionalities with controlled molecular weight, architecture