I'm thinking about 'inverse vulcanized polysulfides' that theoretically are polymer chains of sulfur that are crosslinked with a divinylic monomer (two different sulfur chains can connect to a single vinyl group essentially making the crosslinker f=4). Sulfur chains are known to be dynamic and can make the network behave as a vitrimer or maybe a living polymer since the dynamic mechanism is based on radicals.
The assumption that the divinylic monomer is f=4 may or may not be correct. If it is, then we have a vitrimer, but if only one sulfur chain can connect to a single vinyl group, then we just have a thermoplastic (copolymer).
Is there a way to distinguish between these two possibilities outside of using solid state NMR to look at the bonding on the vinyl group?
Dear Derek Bischoff, there is no confusion between the three classes of the mentionned polymer types :
- basically, a thermopladtic polymer is the one that can be re-melted (re-processed) repeatedly, this is possible because the chains are freely to flow once melting temperature is reached, contrary to thermosets polymers.
- Vitrimers are a recent classe of polymers (Frensh Research Group, 2010), located between thermoplastics and tharmosets.
- a Living polymer is synthesized by one of the living/controlled polymerization techniques, such as Ionic Polymerization, GTP, NMP/SFRP, ATRP, RAFT/MADIX, SET-LRP, Shuttling Polymerization.
My Regards
A thermoplastic, or thermoset plastic, is a plastic polymer material that becomes pliable or moldable at a certain elevated temperature and solidifies upon cooling. Most thermoplastics have a high molecular weight while Vitrimers are a class of plastics, which are derived from thermosetting polymers and are very similar to them. Vitrimers consist of molecular, covalent networks, which can change their topology by thermally activated bond-exchange reactions. But Living polymers are polymers that retain their ability to propagate and grow to the desired size while their degree of termination or chain transfer is still negligible. Theoretical and mechanistic considerations are discussed.
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