Macromolecular Rapid Communications, Vol.30, No.22, 1894-1899, 2009
A Main-Chain de Vries Smectic Liquid Crystal Polymer Prepared by Hoveyda-Grubbs Catalyst Initiated Acyclic Diene Metathesis Polymerization
A main-chain liquid crystalline polymer has been obtained by applying a Hoveyda-Grubbs 2nd generation catalyst in acyclic diene metathesis polymerization (ADMET) of a monomer containing on one end a terminal dimethylvinylsilyl group and at the other end a terminal C-C double bond. This material showed an interesting Iso-de Vries SmA* - SmC* -Glass phase transition with a very small layer shrinkage on progressing from the SmA* phase into the SmC* phase. Will this material present a helical structure along the fiber axis in the SmC* temperature range? Several physical characterization methods including XRD, optical observation, and microtome technique have been used to investigate the internal structural organization in this liquid crystalline fiber.