Robust Amidation Transformation of Plant Oils into
Fatty Derivatives for Sustainable Monomers and Polymers
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Abstract
Sustainable fuels, chemicals, and
materials from renewable resources
have recently gained tremendous momentum in a global scale, although
there are numerous nontrivial hurdles for making them more competitive
with petroleum counterparts. We demonstrate a robust strategy for
the transformation of plant oils into polymerizable monomers and thermoplastic
polymer materials. Specifically, triglycerides were converted into <i>N</i>-hydroxyalkyl fatty amides with the aid of amino alcohols
via a mild base-catalyzed amidation process with nearly quantitative
yields without the use of column chromatography and organic solvents.
These fatty amides were further converted into a variety of methacrylate
monomers, cyclic norbornene monomers and imino ether monomers. Representative
polymers from selected monomers exhibit drastic different physical
properties with subtle structural variations, highlighting the potential
of this particular amidation reaction in the field of biomass transformation