The evolution of poly(hydroxyamide amic acid) to poly(benzoxazole) via stepwise thermal cyclization: Structural changes and gas transport properties

The thermally induced structure transformation and polymer chain rearrangement of a thermally rearranged (TR) material for gas separation has been explored in this work. A tremendous enhancement as high as 215 folds in CO2 permeability has been achieved by converting the pristine poly(hydroxyamide amic acid) (PHAA) to the final polybenzoxazole (PBO) via thermal cyclization at 400 °C for 2 h. The evolution of the pristine polymer PHAA derived from 2,2-bis(3-amino-4-hydroxyphenyl)hexafluropropane (BisAPAF) and trimellitic anhydride chloride (TAC) by thermal treatment from 130 °C to 400 °C has been examined by various characterization techniques including elemental analysis, TGA, TGA-IR, DSC, ATR-FTIR, XPS, XRD and Positron Annihilation Lifetime Spectroscopy (PALS). The stepwise cyclization process commences with cyclodehydration followed by cyclodecarboxylation. At the first step, PHAA transforms to poly(imide benzoxazole) (PIBO) up to 300 °C, while at the second step, the final structure of PBO is formed at 400 °C. Following the changes in the cyclization process, gas transport properties also show the stepwise changes. The significant enlargements of polymer inter-chain distance and free volume cavity radius provide the fundamental understanding for the changes of gas transport properties at the molecular level.