With this CAREER Award from the Macromolecular, Supramolecular and Nanochemistry Program in the Chemistry Division, Professor Jia Niu at Boston College is designs and develops new techniques for the synthesis and degradation of plastics. The method uses highly reactive molecules and catalysts based on copper, ruthenium, and iridium. Professor Niu's research is also using computational methods to better understand how these reactions work and how to improve them. Ring-opening and ring-closing polymerization reactions provide unique benefits in sustainability because of their ability use environmentally-friendly building blocks and degrade under mild conditions. This research has the potential to develop next-generation materials that are used in temperature-stable soft matter, stimuli-responsive materials, and targeted drug delivery. The project contributes to the training of a diverse group of students in a highly interdisciplinary research environment. The undergraduate course “Design Your Own Pet-RAFT†trains undergraduate students in a laboratory setting. Professor Niu also implements outreach activities centered on the minicourse “Polymers and You." This course is designed for 6th-9th grade urban homeless children in the greater Boston area.
This research is focused on developing a new strategy for polymer synthesis that employs radical cascade reactions that provide the key driving force for the controlled synthesis of polymers and stimuli-triggered degradation of precision main-chain polymers. There are three main objectives associated with the project. The first objective focuses on structure-function relationships in radical ring opening polymerizations and couples experimental and computational techniques aimed at optimization of several important reaction parameters. In the second objective, polymers featuring gamma-lactams in the main backbone are prepared using ring-closing cascade polymerization. The last aim concentrates on the synthesis of self-immolative polymers via step-growth and ring-opening metathesis polymerizations techniques. Research associated with this award enables the synthesis of macromolecules that contain functional groups in the main backbone, rather than side chains which is the traditional approach associated with other polymerization techniques. The research is highly transformative and it could lead to a new exciting platform for industrially-relevant controlled radical polymerizations.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
