Poly(vinyl ethers) as building blocks for new materials

The living cationic polymerization of vinyl ethers has been used to prepare a number of new polymers with special properties. Sequential polymerization of the hydrophilic methyl vinyl ether (MVE) and the hydrophobic octadecyl vinyl ether (ODVE) has lead to amphiphilic block-copolymers with emulsifying properties for water/decane mixtures. Poly(vinyl-ether) macromonomers were obtained by end-capping of living polymers with hydroxyethyl acrylate. Copolymerization of polyODVE-macromonomer with usual acrylates lead to highly branched hydrophobic polymers. When the end-capping was performed with bifunctionally living polymers, the corresponding "bis-marcomonomers" were obtained. Copolymerization of such bis-macromonomers with styrene or butyl acrylate, leads to the formation of segmented polymer networks. In the case of polyODVE-poly(butyl acrylate), these networks showed a pronounced phase separation. Due to the crystallinity of the polyODVE domains, these materials showed shape memory properties.