Spiropyran main-chain conjugated polymers.

The first main-chain conjugated copolymers based on alternating spiropyran (SP) and 9,9-dioctylfluorene (F8) units synthesized via Suzuki polycondensation (SPC) are presented. The reaction conditions of SPC are optimized to obtain materials of type P(para-SP-F8) with appreciably high molecular weights up to M(w) ≈ 100 kg mol(-1). (13)C NMR is used to identify the random orientation of the non-symmetric SP unit in P(p-SP-F8). Ultrasound-induced isomerization of P(p-SP-F8) to the corresponding merocyanine form P(p-MC-F8) yields a deep-red solution. This isomerization reaction is followed by (1)H NMR in solution using sonication, whereby the color increasingly changes to deep red. The possibility to incorporate multiple SP units into main-chain polymers significantly broadens existing SP-based polymeric architectures.