The surfeit of elemental sulfur primarily derived from petroleum refining has driven recent efforts to develop new polymerization methods to use sulfur as an alternative feedstocks for polymeric materials. While the thermally initiated ring-opening homopolymerization of elemental sulfur has long been known, there remains a need for new synthetic approaches to prepare useful polymers from these chemical precursors. We will discuss our recent efforts on the polymerization of elemental sulfur to prepare chemically stable copolymers with a very high content of sulfur (50-90 wt% sulfur). We have recently developed a novel polymerization method, termed, <i>inverse vulcanization</i>, to form chemically stable and processable sulfur copolymers by the free radical copolymerization of elemental sulfur and 1,3-diisopropenylbenzene (DIB). The <i>inverse vulcanization</i> process is essentially a bulk copolymerization of sulfur and DIB that mechanistically is a thermally initiated thiol-ene reaction. We have also recently demonstrated the ability to copolymerize a broader wide range of vinylic styrenic and acrylate based comonomers which enables the design of new materials with improved properties. We will discuss these new synthetic advances as well as the applications of these materials in batteries and in optical imaging technologies. 

Polymerizations with elemental sulfur: Sustainable fossil fuel chemistry

253rd National Meeting (2017)

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