Crystalline alternating ethylene‐cyclopentene copolymers and other ethylene‐cycloolefin copolymers

Abstract

Abstract The copolymerization of ethylene with cyclopentene and with cyclohexene in the presence of catalytic systems acting through an anionic co‐ordinated polymerization mechanism is described. In the case of cyclopentene it was possible to obtain crystalline alternating copolymers with stereoregular structure using either catalytic systems acting in the heterogeneous phase or those acting in the homogeneous phase. The structure of the polymeric chains and the properties of these new polymers are described. The fact that the ethylene‐cyclopentene copolymers are much more rich in cycloolefin units than the corresponding ethylene‐cyclohexene copolymers is attributed to phenomena of steric hindrance.