Comonomer effects in vinyl based photocatalytic polymers

The copolymerization of photocatalytic moieties into a polymeric material has emerged as a new development platform for heterogeneous photocatalysts. Incorporating small molecule photocatalysts into polymeric structures has created a new class of heterogeneous photocatalysts. However, the effect and interaction of the comonomer on the photocatalyst have been mostly ignored and little is known about the influence of classical polymer composition on photocatalytic efficiency. Here a vinyl functionalized benzothiadiazole photocatalyst was copolymerized with three dramatically different monomers, methyl methacrylate, styrene, and acrylonitrile, via free radical polymerization, to investigate the effect of the comonomer choice on the photophysical properties and photocatalytic efficiency.