ROMP of Amino Acid Derived Norbornene Monomers
A R T I C L E S
controlled copolymers.31,32 This is commonly achieved by
employing a combination of electron-accepting monomers like
maleic anhydride with electron-donating monomers like alkyl
vinyl ethers. In the case of ROMP, however, it is difficult to
introduce electron-accepting or -withdrawing groups close to
the double bond of cyclic olefin monomers. Therefore, other
approaches have been used to attain alternating ring-opening
metathesis copolymerization. For example, racemic 1-methyl-
norbornene undergoes ROMP alternatingly between the two
enantiomeric monomers catalyzed with ReCl5, but no homo-
polymerization takes place due to steric effects.33 Alternating
ring-opening metathesis copolymerization is also achieved by
the combination of a small amount of highly polymerizable
norbornene and a large amount of less polymerizable cyclo-
pentene using RuCl3-phenol34 and Grubbs Ru complex-Lewis
acid35 as catalysts, wherein the “cage effect” plays an important
role. Appropriately designed dual-site Ru carbene complexes
catalyze the alternating copolymerization of norbornene and a
large excess of cyclooctene, wherein one site of the complex
shows chemoselectivity while the other site does not.36,37 The
combination of polar 2,3-difunctionalized 7-oxanorbornene
derivatives and nonpolar cyclic olefins, including cyclooctene,
also works satisfactorily.38 The alternating copolymers form
well-controlled micrometer-scale aggregates by complementary
noncovalent interactions when diaminopyridine and thymine side
chains are introduced. Very recently, cyclobutene 1-carboxylic
esters and cyclohexene derivatives have been found to undergo
alternating ring-opening metathesis copolymerization.39 This
success derives from the combination of two monomers, neither
of which forms a homopolymer under ROMP conditions.
In spite of those attempts at alternating ring-opening metath-
esis copolymerization, to the best of our knowledge, there is
Scheme 1. Alternating Copolymerization of 1 and 2
no successful example of the combination of two kinds of
norbornene monomers substituted with different functional
groups. This is because the methods mentioned above require
comonomers with largely different ROMP activity, except in
the case of enantioselective ROMP of racemic 1-methylnor-
bornene.
We have reported that amino acid bifunctionalized norbornene
derivatives efficiently undergo ROMP to give polymers with
fairly high molecular weights in good yields.40 The polymeri-
zation proceeds in a living fashion to some extent, and the
polymerizability of the monomers largely depends on the
substituents, stereostructure (endo- and exo-), solvents, and
catalysts. A norbornene monomer having amino acid derived
carboxy groups successfully undergoes ROMP with the Grubbs
second generation Ru catalyst. The carboxy groups need no
protection,41 presumably because the spacer between the nor-
bornene ring and the carboxy groups prevents the carboxy
groups from interacting with the Ru center of the catalyst, which
is coordinated at the double bond in the metathesis intermediate.
This is also operative in the ROMP of norbornene monomers
having amino acid derived nonprotected amino groups, wherein
N-methyl substitution is effective in enhancing the polymeriz-
ability.42 In the course of our study on the ROMP of such acidic
and basic norbornene monomers, we considered trying alternat-
ing copolymerization utilizing acid-base interactions. The
present article describes the alternating ring-opening metathesis
copolymerization of an amino acid derived monomer having
carboxy groups (1) with a monomer having amino groups (2)
using the Grubbs Ru catalyst as illustrated in Scheme 1.
(23) Carillo, A.; Kane, R. S. J. Polym. Sci., Part A: Polym. Chem. 2004,
42, 3352–3359.
(24) Ahmed, S. R.; Bullock, S. E.; Cresce, A. V.; Kofinas, P. Polymer
2003, 44, 4943–4948.
(25) Ahmed, S. R.; Kofinas, P. Macromolecules 2002, 35, 3338–3341.
(26) Saunders, R. S.; Cohen, R. E.; Wong, S. J.; Schrock, R. R.
Macromolecules 1992, 25, 2055–2057.
(27) Stubenrauch, K.; Moitzi, C.; Fritz, G.; Glatter, O.; Trimmel, G.; Stelzer,
F. Macromolecules 2006, 39, 5865–5874.
(28) Stubenrauch, K.; Fritz-Popovski, G.; Ingoli, E.; Grogger, W.; Glatter,
O.; Stelzer, F.; Trimmel, G. Macromolecules 2007, 40, 4592–4600.
(29) Chen, B. Z.; Sleiman, H. F. Macromolecules 2004, 37, 5866–5872.
(30) Gratt, J.; Cohen, R. E. Macromolecules 1997, 30, 3137–3140.
(31) Bianchini, C.; Meli, A. Coord. Chem. ReV. 2002, 225, 35–66.
(32) Rzaev, Z. M. O. Prog. Polym. Sci. 2000, 25, 163–217.
(33) Hamilton, J. G.; Ivin, K. J.; Rooney, J. J.; Waring, L. C. J. Chem.
Soc., Chem. Commun. 1983, 159–161.
(34) (a) Al Samak, B.; Carvill, A. G.; Hamilton, J. G.; Rooney, J. J.;
Thompson, J. M. Chem. Commun. 1997, 2057–2058. (b) Al Samak,
B.; Amir-Ebrahimi, V.; Corry, D. G.; Hamilton, J. G.; Rigby, S.;
Rooney, J. J.; Thompson, J. M. J. Mol. Catal. A.: Chem. 2000, 160,
13–21.
Results and Discussion
(35) Amir-Ebrahimi, V.; Rooney, J. J. J. Mol. Catal. A: Chem. 2004, 208,
11–121.
Monomer Synthesis. N-Methyl-L-phenylalanine derived ex-
o,exo-disubstituted novel norbornene monomer 2 having non-
protected amino groups was synthesized from the N-Boc-
protected precursor (2-Boc) by deprotection using TFA, followed
by neutralization with a base as illustrated in Scheme 2.
EDC·HCl was employed as a condensation agent because the
urea derivative can be easily removed from the reaction mixture
by washing with water.40 The monomer structure was deter-
(36) (a) Bornand, M.; Chen, P. Angew. Chem., Int. Ed. 2005, 44, 7909–
7911. (b) Bornand, M.; Torker, S.; Chen, P. Organometallics 2007,
26, 3585–3596.
(37) Vehlow, K.; Wang, D.; Buchmeiser, M. R.; Blechert, S. Angew. Chem.,
Int. Ed. 2008, 47, 2615–2618.
(38) (a) Nakade, H.; Ilker, M. F.; Jordan, B. J.; Uzun, O.; LaPointe, N. L.;
Coughlin, E. B.; Rotello, V. M. Chem. Commun. 2005, 3271–3273.
(b) Ilker, M. F.; Coughlin, E. B. Macromolecules 2002, 35, 54–58.
(39) Song, A.; Parker, K. A.; Sampson, N. S. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2009,
131, 3444–3445.
(40) (a) Sutthasupa, S.; Terada, K.; Sanda, F.; Masuda, T. J. Polym. Sci.,
Part A: Polym. Chem. 2006, 44, 5337–5343. (b) Sutthasupa, S.; Terada,
K.; Sanda, F.; Masuda, T. Polymer 2007, 48, 3026–3032. (c)
Sutthasupa, S.; Sanda, F.; Masuda, T. Macromol. Chem. Phys. 2008,
209, 930–937.
(41) Sutthasupa, S.; Sanda, F.; Masuda, T. Macromolecules 2008, 41, 305–
311.
(42) Sutthasupa, S.; Sanda, F.; Masuda, T. Macromolecules 2009, 42, 1519–
1525.
(43) Fineman, M.; Ross, S. D. J. Polym. Sci. 1949, 5, 259–265.
9
J. AM. CHEM. SOC. VOL. 131, NO. 30, 2009 10547