Efficient polymer synthesis

• Main Authors: Racz, Miklos, Rashtchian, Cyrus A, Nguyen, Bichlien Hoang, Yekhanin, Sergey, Makarychev, Konstantin, Strauss, Karin
• Format: Patent
• Language: English
• Published: 25.07.2023
• Subjects: CHEMICAL OR PHYSICAL PROCESSES, e.g. CATALYSIS OR COLLOIDCHEMISTRY; INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY [ICT] SPECIALLY ADAPTEDFOR SPECIFIC APPLICATION FIELDS; INVESTIGATING OR ANALYSING MATERIALS BY DETERMINING THEIRCHEMICAL OR PHYSICAL PROPERTIES; MEASURING; PERFORMING OPERATIONS; PHYSICAL OR CHEMICAL PROCESSES OR APPARATUS IN GENERAL; PHYSICS; TESTING; THEIR RELEVANT APPARATUS; TRANSPORTING

The efficiency of polymer synthesis is increased by reducing the number of monomer addition cycles needed to create a set of polymer strands. The number of cycles depends on the sequences of the polymer strands and the order in which each type of monomer is made available for addition to the growing strands. Efficiencies are created by grouping the polymer strands into batches such that all the strands in a batch require a similar number of cycles to synthesize. Efficiencies are also created by selecting an order in which the monomers are made available for addition to the growing polymer strands in a batch. Both techniques can be used together. With these techniques, the number of cycles of monomer addition and commensurate reagent use may be reduced by over 10% as compared to naïve synthesis techniques.