Tandem synthesis of alternating polyesters from renewable resources

The vast majority of commodity materials are obtained from petrochemical feedstocks. These resources will plausibly be depleted within the next 100 years, and the peak in global oil production is estimated to occur within the next few decades. In this regard, biomass represents an abundant carbon-neutral renewable resource for the production of polymers. Here we report a new strategy, based on tandem catalysis, to obtain alternating polyesters from renewable materials. Commercially available complexes are found to be efficient catalysts for the cyclization of dicarboxylic acids followed by alternating copolymerization of the resulting anhydrides with epoxides. This operationally simple method is an attractive strategy for the production of new biodegradable polyesters.