Conjugated porous polymers derived from diethynylarenes by chain-growth polymerization and polycyclotrimerization

The synthesis has been described yielding a new type of rigid conjugated polymer networks which possess a high content of permanent micropores and macropores and exhibit high surface areas up to 1469 m2/g. The networks have been prepared via chain-growth coordination polymerization catalysed with insertion catalysts based on Rh complexes. This polymerization has been newly applied to bifunctional acetylenic monomers of diethynylarene type (1,4-diethynylbenzene, 1,3-diethynylbenzene and 4,4'-diethynylbiphenyl). The covalent structure of the networks consists of the polyacetylene main chains densely connected by arylene struts. The W and Mo metathesis catalysts have been revealed as inefficient for the synthesis of these networks. The increase in the polymerization temperature and time has been shown to affect positively the content and the diameter (up to 22 nm) of the mesopores in the networks. A mechanism has been proposed that explains the mesopores formation as a result of mutual knitting of small particles of the microporous polymer. The application of emulsion polymerization technique allowed to prepare texturally hierarchical polyacetylene networks possessing interconnected open macropores (diameter up to 4,8 μm) the walls of which exhibited micro/mesoporous texture. It was demonstrated that..