From Forest to Future: Synthesis of Sustainable High-Molecular-Weight Polyamides Using, Investigating the AROP of b-Pinene Lactam.

Polyamides (PA) are among the most essential and versatile polymers due to their outstanding characteristics, e.g., high chemical resistance and temperature stability. Furthermore, nature-derived monomers can introduce hard-to-synthesize structures into the PAs for unique polymer properties. Pinene, as one of the most abundant terpenes in nature and its presumable stability-giving bicyclic structure, is therefore highly promising. This work presents simple anionic ring-opening polymerizations of β-pinene lactam (AROP) in-bulk and in solution. PAs with high molecular weights, suitable for further processing, were produced. Their good mechanical, thermal (T d s up to 440°C), and transparent appearance render them promising high-performance biomaterials. In the following, the suitability of different initiators is discussed. Thereby, it was found that NaH was the most successful for in-bulk polymerization, with a degree of polymerization (DP) of 322. For solution-AROP, iPrMgCl·LiCl was successfully used for the first time, achieving DPs up to 163. The obtained PAs were also hot-pressed, and the dynamic mechanical properties were analyzed. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.