Diels-Alder Cycloaddition-Cycloreversion: A Powerful Combo in Materials Design

Reactive polymers are increasingly becoming materials of wide interest because they offer solutions to challenges in biomolecular immobilization, drug-delivery and enzyme modifications. The Diels-Alder (DA) cycloaddition and the retro Diels-Alder (rDA) cycloreversion reaction in combination enables synthesis of maleimide based reactive polymeric materials. Also, the DA cycloaddition offer a reagent-free 'click' reaction to construct various macromolecular architectures. Furthermore, the thermally reversible nature of the DA adducts makes them attractive building blocks for the design of thermoreversible materials. A discussion of some of the author's own research work in this area is presented in this article within the context of recent reports in polymer chemistry employing this reaction combo.