Thermally stable and chemically resistant polymer membranes: aromatic polyoxadiazoles and polytriazoles

This thesis concerns the preparation of membranes from thermally stable and chemically resistant polymers. Two polymer families from the category of heterocyclic and aromatic polymers have been selected for investigation, the polyoxadiazoles and the polytriazoles, respectively. A major problem concerning these types of polymers is their bad processability due to their insolubility and infusibility. For the polyoxadiazoles this problem is circumvented by using a two-step preparation process through the preparation of a processable prepolymer membrane followed by a thermal conversion of the prepolymer into the desired polyoxadiazole. For the polytriazoles solubility is acquired by using a phenylated form of a polytriazole backbone.