Novel Monovinyl Methacrylic Monomers Containing Secondary Functionality for Ultrarapid Polymerization: Steady-State Evaluation

Synthesis and evaluation of novel urethane macromonomers for the formulation of fracture tough 3D printable dental materials

3D printing of materials which combine fracture toughness, high modulus and high strength is quite challenging. Most commercially available 3D printing resins contain a mixture of multifunctional (meth)acrylates. The resulting 3D printed materials are therefore brittle and not adapted for the preparation of denture bases. For this reason, this article focuses on toughening by incorporation of triblock copolymers in methacrylate-based materials. In a first step, three urethane dimethacrylates with various alkyl spacer length were synthesized in a one-pot two-step synthesis. Each monomer was combined with 2-phenoxyethyl methacrylate as a monofunctional monomer and a polycaprolactone-polydimethylsiloxane-polycaprolactone triblock copolymer was added as toughener. The formation of nanostructures via self-assembly was proven by small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The addition of the triblock copolymer resulted in a strong increase in fracture toughness for all mixtures. The nature of the urethane dimethacrylate had a significant impact on fracture toughness and flexural strength and modulus of the cured materials. Most promising systems were also investigated via dynamic fatigue propagation da/dN measurements, confirming that the toughening also works under dynamic load. By carefully selecting the length of the urethane dimethacrylate spacer and the amount of block copolymer, materials with the desired physical properties could be efficiently formulated. Especially the formulation containing the medium alkyl spacer length (DMA2/PEMA) and 5 wt% BCP1 (block copolymer), exhibits excellent mechanical properties and high fracture toughness.

Elucidation of Substantial Differences in Ring-Opening Polymerization Outcomes from Subtle Variation of Glucose Carbonate-Based Monomer Substitution Patterns and Substituent Types

The substituents present upon five-membered bicyclic glucose carbonate monomers were found to greatly affect the reactivities and regioselectivities during ring-opening polymerization (ROP), which contrast in significant and interesting ways from previous studies on similar systems, while also leading to predictable effects on the thermal properties of the resulting polycarbonates. Polymerization behaviors were probed for a series of five five-membered bicyclic 2,3-glucose-carbonate monomers having 4,6-ether, -carbonate, or -sulfonyl urethane protecting groups, under catalysis with three different organobase catalysts. Irrespective of the organobase catalyst employed, regioregular polycarbonates were obtained via ROP of monomers with ether substituents, while the backbone connectivities of polymers derived from monomers with carbonate protecting groups suffered transcarbonylation reactions, resulting in irregular backbone connectivities and broad molar mass distributions. The sulfonyl urethane-protected monomers were unable to undergo organobase-catalyzed ROP, possibly due to the acidity of the proton in urethane functionality. The thermal behaviors of polycarbonates with ether and carbonate pendant groups were investigated in terms of thermal stability and glass transition temperature (Tg). A two-stage thermal decomposition was observed when tert-butyloxycarbonyl (BOC) groups were employed as protecting side chains, while all other polycarbonates presented high thermal stabilities with a single-stage thermal degradation. Tg was greatly affected by side-chain bulkiness, with values ranging from 39 to 139 °C. These fundamental findings of glucose-based polycarbonates may facilitate the development of next-generation sustainable highly functional materials.

Evaluation of alternative monomers to HEMA for dental applications

OBJECTIVE

The objective of this work is to find potential alternative monomers to 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate (HEMA) for dental materials (self-etch adhesives and luting composites).

METHODS

Monomers 1-9 were tested as potential HEMA substitutes. Methacrylates 4, 5 and 6 and (N-methyl)acrylamides 7-9 were synthesized and characterized by ¹H NMR spectroscopy. The reactivity of each monomer was studied using photo-DSC. Mixtures of monomers 1-9 with the urethane dimethacrylate UDMA (1/1: wt/wt) were formulated and cured. The water sorption and solubility of these materials were determined according to ISO 4049. Luting composites based on monomers 1-9 or on HEMA were formulated. The flexural strength and modulus of elasticity were measured using a three-point bending setup, according to ISO 4049. Self-etch adhesives containing monomers 1-9 or HEMA were prepared and used to mediate a bond between the dental composite Tetric EvoCeram^® and both dentin and enamel. The shear bond strength (SBS) was measured using a Zwick universal testing machine.

RESULTS

Polymerizable diols 3 and 4 as well as (N-methyl)acrylamides 7-9 were found to be significantly more reactive than HEMA. Resins based on the hydrophilic monomers 3, 7 and 8 exhibited a significantly higher water sorption than the corresponding HEMA-containing material. Luting composites containing monomers 2, 3, 6 and 7 showed similar or even improved mechanical properties compared to the reference material containing HEMA. Self-etch adhesives containing monomers 4 and 9 provided significantly higher dentin SBS than the reference material.

SIGNIFICANCE

Some of the evaluated monomers are promising candidates for the development of HEMA-free dental materials.

Highly reactive, liquid diacrylamides via synergistic combination of spatially arranged curing moieties

Six polymerizable N,N’-diacylamides containing spatially arranged N-acryl, N-allyl and/or N-alkyl groups were prepared via two-step syntheses and characterized by ¹H/¹³C NMR-spectra, refractive index (RI) and viscosity measurements. Photo DSC measurements on activated samples provided reactivity parameters ∆H_p, R_p,max and t_max, while FTIR spectra before and after curing elucidated the underlying polymerization mechanism. Mechanical testing of the obtained polymers exhibited gradual differences in network densities, depending on the intramolecular arrangement and number of functional groups. Overall, a general building principle for highly reactive, liquid diacrylamides via synergistic combination of optimally arranged functional groups could be identified. The highest possible level of intramolecular synergism was found for low viscous N,N'-diacryloyl-N,N'-diallyl-1,4-but-2-enediamine.

Monomers for adhesive polymers, 18. Synthesis, photopolymerization and adhesive properties of polymerizable α-phosphonooxy phosphonic acids

Four polymerizable α-phosphonooxy phosphonic acids 7a, 7b, 9 and 16 were synthesized in seven steps. They were characterized by 1H, 13C and 31P NMR spectroscopy and by high-resolution mass spectroscopy. The copolymerization of acidic monomers 7a, 7b, 9 and 16 with 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate was studied using a differential scanning calorimeter. Due to the presence of two acidic groups, those monomers are significantly more reactive than 10-methacryloyloxydecylphosphonic acid (MDPA) and 10-methacryloyloxydecyl dihydrogen phosphate (MDP). Self-etch adhesives based on monomers 7a, 7b, 9 and 16 were formulated and used to mediate a bond between a dental composite and the dental hard tissues (dentin and enamel). These adhesives exhibit excellent performances and provide significantly higher dentin and enamel shear bond strength than adhesives based on MDP or MDPA.

A complete kinetic study of a versatile functional monomer: acetoacetoxyethyl methacrylate (AAEMA)

The current study reports the complete kinetic analysis of acetoacetoxyethyl methacrylate (AAEMA).

Recent advances and developments in composite dental restorative materials

Composite dental restorations represent a unique class of biomaterials with severe restrictions on biocompatibility, curing behavior, esthetics, and ultimate material properties. These materials are presently limited by shrinkage and polymerization-induced shrinkage stress, limited toughness, the presence of unreacted monomer that remains following the polymerization, and several other factors. Fortunately, these materials have been the focus of a great deal of research in recent years with the goal of improving restoration performance by changing the initiation system, monomers, and fillers and their coupling agents, and by developing novel polymerization strategies. Here, we review the general characteristics of the polymerization reaction and recent approaches that have been taken to improve composite restorative performance.

Rapid Solid-State Photopolymerization of Cyclic Acetal-Containing Acrylates

A cyclic acetal-functionalized urethane acrylate monomer is synthesized here and polymerized in a crystalline state without the polymerization kinetics being deleteriously affected by the solid state. Depending on the processing conditions, the cyclic acetal urethane acrylate monomer exists in either a metastable liquid state or a crystalline state at ambient conditions. Due to mobility restrictions, extremely poor polymerization kinetics and functional group conversions are typically achieved in solid state polymerizations. However, the solid-state photopolymerization of a cyclic acetal urethane acrylate results in nearly identical polymerization rates and ultimately higher conversion in the crystalline state than in the liquid state under otherwise identical conditions. We conclude that the crystallization process occurs in such a manner as to template the acrylic double bonds in a structure that facilitates rapid, minimally activated propagation.

Reactivity of Monovinyl (Meth)Acrylates Containing Cyclic Carbonates

The tremendous diversity of materials properties available with polymers is due in large part to the ability to design structures from the monomeric state. The ease of use of comonomer mixtures only expands this versatility. While final polymer properties are obviously important in the selection or development of a material for a given purpose, for a number of applications, such as optical fiber coatings, photolithography and microelectronics, the additional requirement of a very rapid polymerization process may be equally critical. A class of unusually reactive mono-(meth)acrylate monomers bearing secondary functionality that includes carbonates, carbamates and oxazolidones, has been demonstrated but not fully explained. Here, the influence of an integral cyclic carbonate functional group on (meth)acrylate photopolymerization kinetics is examined in detail with respect to monomers with a wide variety of alternative secondary functionality structure as well as in comparison to conventional mono- and di-(meth)acrylates. The kinetic results from full cure studies of several cyclic carbonate-containing monomers clearly highlight specific structural variations that effectively promote monomer reactivity. Copolymerizations with tetrahydrofurfuryl methacrylate reflect similar dramatic kinetic effects associated with the novel monomers while partial cure homopolymerization studies reveal exceptional dark cure behavior linked to observations of uncommonly low ratios of termination to propagation rates throughout the conversion profile. Temperature effects on reaction kinetics, including both reaction rate and the individual kinetic parameters, as well as the temperature dependence of hydrogen bonding interactions specifically involving the secondary functional groups are probed as a means to understand better the fundamentally interesting and practically important behavior of these monomers.

Hydrogen bonding interactions in methacrylate monomers and polymers

It is well appreciated that hydrogen bonding affects a variety of monomer and polymer properties. This study focused on Bis-GMA and urethane dimethacrylate (UDMA) to help elucidate how the strength and nature of specific noncovalent interactions involved with these different functional dimethacrylate structures are expressed in the monomers and polymers. Hydrogen bonding interactions in monomers and comonomer mixtures as well as in appropriate model compounds were examined by FT-IR under ambient conditions, at elevated temperatures and in dilution studies. The investigation of hydrogen bonding extended to monomer viscosity, photopolymerization reaction kinetics, and polymer mechanical properties. The strength of hydrogen bonding was shown not only to be greater for Bis-GMA compared with UDMA, but there is also greater contribution from intermolecular interactions that enhance the hydrogen bonding effects. While UDMA-based polymers reach significantly higher levels of conversion compared with Bis-GMA materials, the stronger hydrogen bonding reinforcement associated with Bis-GMA appears to provide for comparable mechanical strength properties. Depending on the hydrogen bond donor functionality of a monomer as well as its neighboring functional groups, overall monomer structure and comonomers used, hydrogen bonding can favorably affect polymerization reactivity and mechanical properties, even in materials that form highly crosslinked polymeric networks.

Copolymerization and Dark Polymerization Studies for Photopolymerization of Novel Acrylic Monomers

The copolymerization behavior and the dark polymerization kinetics of highly reactive novel acrylic monomers were compared to traditional acrylate monomers. Copolymerization of thiol functionalities with novel acrylic monomers was characterized, and it was observed that the inclusion of secondary functionalities such as carbamates, carbonates, and cyclic carbonates, in acrylic monomers significantly alters the relative reactivity of the novel acrylates with thiols. While traditional aliphatic acrylates exhibited propagation to chain transfer ratios ranging between 0.8 (± 0.1)-1.5(± 0.2), the novel acrylates characterized by secondary functionalities exhibited much higher propagation to chain transfer ratios ranging from 2.8(± 0.2)-4(± 0.2). In the dark polymerization studies, the kinetics of the novel acrylates were evaluated following cessation of the UV light. The novel acrylates exhibited extensive polymerization in the dark compared to most traditional acrylates and diacrylates. For instance, cyclic carbonate acrylate was observed to attain 35 % additional conversion in the dark when the UV light was extinguished at 35 % conversion, whereas traditional acrylates such as hexyl acrylate attained only 3 % additional conversion when the UV light was extinguished at 35 %, and a diacrylate such as HDDA attained 15 % additional conversion when the UV light was extinguished at 40 % conversion. Also, through choice of appropriate monomers, the dark polymerization studies were performed such that the polymerization rate was approximately the same at the point the light was extinguished for all these monomers. The copolymerization and dark polymerization studies support the hypothesis that the nature of the propagating species in the novel acrylates is altered as compared to traditional acrylic monomers and polymerizations.

Design, Development and Evaluation of Monovinyl Acrylates Characterized by Secondary Functionalities as Reactive Diluents to Diacrylates

This study focuses on the design and development of novel monovinylic (meth)acrylate monomers with enhanced polymerization kinetics and the evaluation of their performance as reactive diluents in diacrylate systems. Novel (meth)acrylic monomers characterized by several new secondary functionalities are developed in this study and are shown to exhibit reactivities 10-70 fold greater than traditional monoacrylates such as hexyl acrylate. These monomers were designed based on our understanding of interactions between monomer structure, polymerizations kinetics, and polymer properties. Performance of these monovinyl monomers as reactive diluents is also investigated in this study. Copolymerization of these monomers with diacrylates enhanced both the reactivity and the mechanical properties of the diacrylate system. Specifically, while copolymerization of a diacrylate system with traditional monoacrylates such as hexyl acrylate decreases the overall reactivity of the system, its copolymerization with the novel monomers led to comonomer mixtures, that were 30-50% more reactive than either of the individual components, with initial polymerization rates increased by as much as 2 times the more reactive component. Further, the copolymerization of these novel monovinyl systems with diacrylates also enabled formation of polymers with enhanced mechanical properties over the corresponding diacrylates including a more homogeneous network structure as indicated by a glass transition temperature that was narrowed by up to 55 % while increasing the glass transition temperature by as much as 10°C.

Controlling Network Structure in Degradable Thiol−Acrylate Biomaterials to Tune Mass Loss Behavior

Degradable thiol-acrylate materials were synthesized from the mixed-mode polymerization of a diacrylate poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) monomer with thiol monomers of varying functionalities to control the final network structure, ultimately influencing the material's degradation behavior and properties. The influence of the concentration of thiol groups and monomer functionality on the mass loss profiles were examined experimentally and theoretically. Mass loss behavior was also predicted for networks with varying extents of cyclization, PEG molecular weight, and backbone chain length distributions. Experimental results indicate that increasing the thiol concentration from 10 to 50 mol % shifted the reverse gelation time from 35 to 8 days and the extent of mass loss at reverse gelation from 75 to 40%. Similarly, decreasing the thiol functionality from 4 to 1 shifted the reverse gelation time from 18 to 8 days and the mass loss extent at reverse gelation from 70 to 45%.

Degradable thiol-acrylate photopolymers: polymerization and degradation behavior of an in situ forming biomaterial

Degradable thiol-acrylate photopolymers are a new class of biomaterials capable of rapidly polymerizing under physiological conditions upon exposure to UV light, with or without added photoinitiators, and to depths exceeding 10 cm. These materials are formed in situ, and the versatility of their chemistry affords a high degree of control over the final material properties. For example, variations in monomer mole fractions directly affect the final network molecular structure, varying the time required to achieve complete mass loss from 25 to 100 days, the molecular weight distributions of the degradation products, and the swelling ratios and compressive moduli throughout degradation. Additionally, varying the mole fraction of multifunctional thiol monomer in the initial reaction mixture controls the concentration of reactive sites in the network available for post-polymerization modification of the polymer.

Development of highly reactive mono-(meth)acrylates as reactive diluents for dimethacrylate-based dental resin systems

Reactive diluents such as triethyleneglycol-dimethacrylate (TEGDMA) have been widely used with bisphenol-A-glycidyl-dimethacrylate (Bis-GMA) to achieve restorative resins with appropriate viscosity and higher conversion. However, additional water sorption and polymerization shrinkage were also introduced. The aim of this work is to investigate whether the cure and material properties can be improved in dental resins containing novel mono-(meth)acrylates as reactive diluents so that these Bis-GMA-based copolymers have reduced polymerization shrinkage but higher overall double bond conversion. Several ultra-high-reactivity mono-(meth)acrylates that contain secondary functionalities have been synthesized and investigated. The polymerization rate and double bond conversion were monitored using photo-FTIR. Polymerization shrinkage, dynamic mechanical analysis, and flexural strength were characterized. Compared with the Bis-GMA/TEGDMA control, the Bis-GMA/mono-methacrylate systems studied showed higher final conversions, faster curing rates, and decreased polymerization shrinkage. Our optimum system Bis-GMA/morpholine carbamate methacrylate achieved 86% final conversion (vs. 65%), a polymerization rate 3.5 times faster, and a 30% reduction in polymerization volumetric shrinkage. These results indicate that certain highly reactive, novel mono-(meth)acrylates possess very promising potential to replace TEGDMA as reactive diluents and can readily be applied to develop superior dental resins.