Linear polyethylenes with functional groups at precise intervals along the backbone possess a number of remarkable properties, but the current synthetic methods that produce these precise polymers are difficult to scale up beyond the laboratory setting. When evaluating alternative synthetic routes, a critical question is how precise must the polymer microstructure be to achieve the properties of interest? As a first step in answering this question, we present morphological characterization of a nearly precise polymer—that is, an acid-containing polymer wherein the acid groups are separated by either n or n + 1 methylene groups. We find that the size scale and uniformity of the amorphous morphologies of the nearly precise acid-containing polymer and its sodium-neutralized ionomer are essentially indistinguishable from the precise polymers based on X-ray scattering. Meanwhile, the nearly precise polymer is strikingly distinct from a pseudorandom copolymer with similar average composition. This result suggests that the properties of nearly precise polymers could likewise be quite similar to truly precise polymers and beckons future work to explore their properties.

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近乎精确的含酸聚合物和离聚物的高形态有序性

沿着主链具有精确间隔的官能团的线性聚乙烯具有许多显着的特性，但目前生产这些精确聚合物的合成方法很难在实验室环境之外扩大规模。在评估替代合成路线时，一个关键问题是聚合物微结构必须有多精确才能获得感兴趣的特性？作为回答这个问题的第一步，我们提出了一种近乎精确的聚合物的形态表征——即一种含酸的聚合物，其中酸基团被n或n隔开+ 1 个亚甲基。我们发现，几乎精确的含酸聚合物及其钠中和离聚物的无定形形态的尺寸尺度和均匀性与基于 X 射线散射的精确聚合物基本没有区别。同时，几乎精确的聚合物与具有相似平均组成的伪无规共聚物明显不同。这一结果表明，近乎精确的聚合物的性质同样可能与真正精确的聚合物非常相似，并呼吁未来的工作来探索它们的性质。