Biobased terpenes have recently attracted great interest as monomer feedstock for new polymers. An interesting class of molecules are linear terpenoids with a hydroxyl end group (e.g., geraniol, farnesol, phytol and their hydrogenated analogs). Their reaction with acryloyl chloride gives an acrylate monomer, which when polymerized produces a polymer with short, polyisoprene-like sidechains. The potential utility of these polymers is that the side-group increases the thickness of the polymer chain, which increases their entanglement molecular weight. Polymers with very high entanglement molecular weight are of interest in the fabrication of super-soft elastomers with low modulus. This work discusses our efforts to prepare terpenoid-based acrylate monomers, polymerize these monomers by reversible addition fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) polymerization, and measure their viscoelastic properties using oscillatory shear rheology to assemble master curves through time-temperature superposition.

Synthesis, polymerization, and characterization of terpenoid acrylates

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