There is great current interest in the synthesis of well-defined and functional polymers using controlled radical polymerization (CRP) techniques. The advances in the development of these techniques has enabled access to a wide range of functional and responsive materials for a diverse range of applications. In the O'Reilly group we use CRP techniques to synthesize functional and responsive amphiphilic diblock copolymers from a range of monomers which have unique properties such as responsive capabilities, catalytic activity or selective recognition. We are interested in the solution self-assembly and the characterization of the resultant aggregates along with their exploration in a range of applications. One interesting example is in the design of catalytically active nanoreactors which can exhibit enhanced rates of catalysis and also excellent recovering and reuse. Furthermore, these nanostructures can be designed to undergo fast and reversible transitions between different morphologies (and hence give rise to a change in physical properties) as a result of an alteration in the packing parameter of the constituent polymers in response to applied external stimuli. We have explored the application of these responsive materials in controlled release and also catalysis applications.

Using polymeric nanoreactors for catalysis

248th National Meeting (2014)

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