Ladder Polymers: The new generation

Review: Polymers with high thermal, mechanical, and chemical stability based on a ladder‐type structure (see figure), have suffered in the past from insolubility or infusibility. A new strategy for the controlled synthesis of processible ladder polymers, based on Diels‐Alder polymerization is reviewed, and the polymers considered as precursors to graphite ribbons, materials predicted to have properties lying between graphite and single‐stranded polyacetylene. equation image