A Convenient Dual-Side Anionic Initiator Based on 2,6-Luditine/s-Butyl Lithium

A novel convenient dual-side initiator of lutidine dianion for anionic polymerization has been investigated in terms of their initiation and propagation kinetics. This lutidine dianion could be synthesized in quantitative yields reacting commercial products of 2,6-lutidine with sec-butyl lithium without any complex organic synthesis, and could be used effectively as the dual-side initiator to synthesize polyisoprene with various molecular weights via living anionic polymerization. In addition, this lutidine dianion can produce 50% of 1.4-microstructure contents in polyisoprene which is very important for elastomeric property of polydienes. All experimental evidences showed the living property and were consistent with quantitative yields without any side reactions when the anionic living polymerization proceeded using lutidine dianion as the initiator.