Homo- and copolymerization of 5-ethylidene-2-norbornene with ethylene by [2-C5Me4-4,6-tBu2C6H2O]TiCl2/AliBu3/Ph3CB(C6F5)4 catalyst system and epoxidation of the resulting copolymer

5-Ethylidene-2-norbornene (ENB) polymerization and copolymerization with ethylene (E) catalyzed by constrained geometry catalyst 2-tetramethylcyclopentadienyl-4,6-di-tert-butylphenoxytitanium dichloride (1) were studied in the presence of AliBu3 and Ph3CB(C6F5)4 (TIBA/B). The catalyst system shows moderate activity on the homopolymerization of ENB, and higher activity on the copolymerization of E/ENB under atmospheric pressure of ethylene. 1H NMR analysis indicates that ENB was regioselectively incorporated into the copolymer backbone through the endocyclic double bond, leaving the ethylidene double bond unreacted. The ethylidene group contained in the poly(E-co-ENB) was quantitatively converted to the epoxy group with m-chloroperbenzoic acid, producing functionalized poly(E-co-ENB)s. The parent and functionalized copolymers have been characterized using IR, NMR, DSC, and GPC techniques.