The use of radical polymerization in the synthesis of telechelic oligomers

The following is a review of the newer methods that are available for the synthesis of telechelic oligomers using radical polymerizations. We detail advances in the field since John Ebdon's review published in 1995 [J.R. Ebdon, Eastmond, New Methods of Polymer Synthesis, Blackie Academic, 1995, ISBN 0751402427]. The available methods are categorized into sections on: chain cleavage techniques; controlled polymerizations; dead end polymerizations and transfer methods. We also introduce a new mathematical technique for determining chain transfer constants that is applicable when transfer to solvent is the dominant termination mechanism. In this new method, we differentiate the Mayo equation with respect to solvent concentration ([S]) and then plot ∂(1/Xn)/∂[S] against 1/[M]. This procedure then gives Cs as the gradient.