Cui group’s achievement of “precise control of selective coordination polymerization of bulk general monomers with rare earth catalysts” won the first prize of Jilin Natural Science Award in 2020.

Rare earth catalyzed selective coordination polymerization of general monomers can accurately control the chain structure. It is not only an important way for the high performance of general polymer materials, but also an important topic in the field of polymer science. Cui Dongmei’s research team took a large number of general monomers such as ethylene, styrene and conjugated diolefins and biomass resource monomers as the research objects. Starting from the design of rare earth catalysts, they realized regioselective (CO) polymerization of conjugated dienes, stereoselective switching polymerization and stereoselective (CO) polymerization of styrene; The biodegradable polyester with regular structure and topological structure was synthesized by coordination method. This achievement has discovered and invented new mechanisms, new methods and new strategies for precisely controlling the selectivity of coordination polymerization, constructed macromolecules with novel chain structure by using simple monomers, not only developed the coordination polymerization theory, but als o developed new materials with high performance and application prospects. 

Among the 8 representative papers on the above work, 5 have impact factors > 12, of which 4 are published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society and German Applied Chemistry respectively. There are 11 authorized invention patents, 3 U.S. patents and 1 European patent, and 1 patent was selected as one hundred excellent patents in China in 2010.