The reactor polymer alloys: The shifting of the frontier of polymer research

The discovery (1968) of the high yield Ziegler-Natta catalysts based on active MgCl2 was the beginning of a scientific and industrial revolution that has brought about the creation of superactive, isospecific, spheriform fourth generation catalytic systems. The rationalization of the polymer/catalyst replication phenomenon and the understanding of the catalyst ''architecture'' effects on polymer shape and morphology has led to the exploitation of the ''Reactor Granule Technology''. This has made the generation of a broad range of homo, copolymers and multiphase alloys (Catalloy) possible by synthesis, most of which having a previously unobtainable spectrum of performance (Refs. 1,2,3). The reactor granule technology concept has also been the basis for the achievement of a family of polyolefin/non polyolefin alloys with engineering properties. More recently, the reactor granule approach has been extended so as to couple the advantages of both heterogeneous and homogeneous metallocene catalysts (mixed catalysis), thus allowing the synthesis of a very new family of ''in situ'' polyolefin alloys.