EOX copolymerized formaldehyde technology at the Qingdao Institute of Energy, Chinese Academy of Sciences

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Recently, Researcher Wan Xiaobo, head of the team focused on bio-based and biomimetic polymer materials at the Qingdao Institute of Bioenergy and Bioprocess Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and his colleagues discovered in their research that under appropriate initiation conditions, copolymerized and modified POM can be obtained by copolymerizing trioxane (TOX) with corresponding oxetane monomers. Although copolymers of TOX with other oxygen heterocycles (such as propylene oxide, dioxane, etc.) have been patented, copolymers of it with oxetane monomers are rarely reported. Wan Xiaobo and others conducted systematic research on the copolymerization of TOX with oxetanes having side chains of different lengths; by optimizing the polymerization conditions, they significantly increased the proportion of oxetane in the copolymer (up to 20%), thereby **improving the thermal stability of the copolymerized POM. Among them, the thermal stability of the copolymer of TOX and 3-ethoxymethyl-3-ethyl-oxetane (EOX) is the best. Without end-capping stabilization, the initial decomposition temperature of the copolymerized POM containing approximately 17% EOX was nearly 70°C higher than that of POM (Figure 1). This achievement was published in the latest issue of Macromolecular Chemistry and Physics. Currently, the team is conducting in-depth research on the aforementioned copolymerization mechanism, with the aim of further optimizing the reaction conditions to increase the molecular weight of the copolymerized formaldehyde. They also plan to use capping methods to enhance stability, with the hope of enabling large-scale application in actual production.