Supramolecular network polymers formed from polyamidine and carboxy‐terminated telechelic poly(n‐butyl acrylate) via amidinium‐carboxylate salt bridges

ABSTRACT We have prepared the amidinium‐carboxylate salt bridge‐based supramolecular network polymers from a carboxy‐terminated telechelic poly( n ‐butyl acrylate) and a linear polyamidine having N , N′ ‐di‐substituted acetamidine group in the main chain. FTIR measurements indicated that the salt bridge was attributed to the three‐dimensional network formation. Virtually, no fluidity was observed for the blend containing equimolar amounts of the carboxyl group and the amidine group, which showed a high G′ value of about 1 MPa at −5 °C. For comparison, the supramolecular network polymers crosslinked by ammonium‐carboxylate salt were prepared using a linear polyethyleneimine instead of the polyamidine. The blend with equimolar amounts of the carboxyl group and the secondary amino group showed liquid‐like fluidity with a G′ value of about 0.01 MPa at −5 °C, which was attributed to the fact that a certain amount of the carboxyl group remained as its free form, as evidenced by FTIR analysis. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Polym. Sci., Part A: Polym. Chem. 2016 , 54 , 2148–2155