Time and Temperature Dependence of Macro-ion-Macro-ester Equilibrium in the Cationic Polymerization of Tetrahydrofuran by HOSO2F

Abstract Reactivity and equilibrium of two active species-tertiary oxonium ion (TOI) and superacid ester (SAE)-in the system of cationic polymerization of tetrahydrofuran (THF) initiated by fluorosulfonic acid (FSO3H) in dichloromethame has been studied. In the given system, it was found that TOI is mainly responsible for the polymerization at the initial stage; however, the cocentration of TOI decreases rapidly with the progress of polymerization and finally becomes almost untraceable. On the other hand, [SAE] monotonically increases as the polymerization proceeds. The stability of TOI appears less than that of SAE under the given reaction conditions. Results demonstrate that both the prog…