Photogeneration of reactive amine functionalities within polymers. Synthesis of photoprecursor copolymers and their use in photocuring

The chemistry of amines is of particular importance to the field of coating chemistry as amines are used in numerous curative formulations as well as in a number of other applications. While photogenerated acid has been used in numerous applications involving thin-film coatings, the same cannot be said of photogenerated base. The reason for this dichotomy is simply that photogenerated bases are not readily available and that precious few methods for their preparation have been described. We have recently described the preparation of novel light sensitive urethanes based on the α,$aplha-dimethyl-3,5-dimethoxybenzyloxycarbonyl group. These urethanes are efficient sources of free amines and diamines when irradiated in the UV. Following our earlier work with the photogeneration of low molecular weight amines from a variety of o-nitrobenzyl carbamates, this work describes the use of the o-nitrobenzyl photo-rearrangement in the efficient photogeneration of polymeric amines from the corresponding carbamates.