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Lewis acidic, chelating diborane 1 forms stable oxonium acids 2 in the presence of excess MeOH or water. Diborane 1 is shown to be an effective co-initiator for the suspension polymerization of isobutene in aqueous media at sufficiently low temperatures. Poly(isobutene) or butyl rubber is obtained at moderate to high conversion and with Mw < 200 K and PDI approximately 2 under these conditions.
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Lewis et al. (2004) studied this question.
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