Reactivities of monomers towards the 1-phenylethyl radical

Abstract

The reactivities of styrene, methyl acrylate, methyl methacrylate, methyl isopropenyl ketone, methyl vinyl ketone and 2-vinylpyridine towards the 1-phenylethyl radical at 100° have been compared using acenaphthylene as the reference monomer. Binary copolymerizations with acenaphthylene were initiated by 1,1′[^(13)C]azobis-1,1′-phenylethane; ^(13)C-NMR spectroscopy was used to compare the numbers of initiator fragments attached to the two types of monomeric units in each of the various copolymers. The relative reactivities of the monomers towards the initiating radical match their relative reactivities towards the polystyrene radical, as deduced from monomer reactivity ratios for copolymerizations with styrene.

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