Organic Syntheses Using Polymeric Supports, Polymeric Reagents, and Polymeric Catalysts

In conventional organic syntheses, organic molecules are treated with a reagent or reagents and the transformed organic molecules, now termed the product, are isolated. The various steps in a conventional organic synthesis may be represented schematically as in Fig. 1. In this scheme a low molecular weight molecule (A) is treated with a low molecular weight reagent (B). When the reaction has gone to the maximum extent (reactions seldom proceed to 100% completion), the desired product (C) is isolated from the reaction mixture. The isolation is done by conventional procedures of extraction precipitation, distillation, sublimation, and various chromatographic methods. In this way the desired product (C) is separated from the reaction by-products, solvents, and any catalysts (D) which might be present in the final reaction mixture. Frequently the isolation process involves one or more of the above operations to obtain the pure product (C).