Fabiana Siragusa1,Thomas Habets1,Bruno Grignard1,Christophe Detrembleur1
University of Liege1
Fabiana Siragusa1,Thomas Habets1,Bruno Grignard1,Christophe Detrembleur1
University of Liege1
Designing new polymers from wastes while making them intrinsically degradable has become a new challenge to overcome the plastic waste accumulation in the environment and the associated pollutions. Recently, we engineered a novel synthetic pathway to create polycarbonates<sup>1</sup> by the room temperature step-growth copolymerization of highly reactive CO<sub>2</sub>-sourced exovinylene biscyclic carbonates with various diols derived from biomass<sup>2</sup> or waste commodity plastics. These innovative low carbon footprint polymers are thermally stable, isolable and processable. On the path to circularity, their unique microstructural features offer competitive depolymerization scenarios, enabling the formation of new value-added organic scaffolds that can serve as organic building blocks in medicinal chemistry and organic synthesis, or as monomers for producing new polymeric materials<sup>3,4</sup>. In this talk, we will discuss how these polycarbonates can be easily depolymerized, with a special emphasis to describe the mechanism and the selectivity of the depolymerization process.<br/>(1) Gennen, S.; Grignard, B.; Tassaing, T.; Jérôme, C.; Detrembleur, C. CO2 -Sourced α-Alkylidene Cyclic Carbonates: A Step Forward in the Quest for Functional Regioregular Poly(Urethane)s and Poly(Carbonate)s. <i>Angew Chem Int Ed</i> <b>2017</b>, <i>56</i>, 10394–10398. https://doi.org/10.1002/anie.201704467.<br/>(2) Siragusa, F.; van den Broeck, E.; Ocando, C.; Müller, A. J.; de Smet, G.; Maes, B. U. W.; de Winter, J.; van Speybroeck, V.; Grignard, B.; Detrembleur, C. Access to Biorenewable and CO2-Based Polycarbonates from Exovinylene Cyclic Carbonates. <i>ACS Sustain Chem Eng</i> <b>2021</b>, <i>9</i>, 1714–1728. https://doi.org/10.1021/acssuschemeng.0c07683.<br/>(3) Siragusa, F.; Demarteau, J.; Habets, T.; Olazabal, I.; Robeyns, K.; Evano, G.; Mereau, R.; Tassaing, T.; Grignard, B.; Sardon, H.; Detrembleur, C. Unifying Step-Growth Polymerization and On-Demand Cascade Ring-Closure Depolymerization via Polymer Skeletal Editing. <i>Macromolecules</i> <b>2022</b>, <i>55</i>, 4637–4646. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.macromol.2c00696.<br/>(4) Siragusa, F.; Habets, T.; Méreau, R.; Evano, G.; Grignard, B.; Detrembleur, C. Catalyst-Free Approach for the Degradation of Bio- and CO2-Sourced Polycarbonates: A Step toward a Circular Plastic Economy. <i>ACS Sustain Chem Eng</i> <b>2022</b>, <i>10</i>, 8863–8875. https://doi.org/10.1021/acssuschemeng.2c01891.