This study highlights the value of nonisothermal kinetic methods in selecting temperature conditions for the isothermal preparation of microporous polymeric materials. A dicyanate ester is synthesized and the kinetics of its polymerization in diphenyl sulfone are studied by calorimetry under nonisothermal conditions. The kinetics are analyzed by a model-based approach, using the Kamal model, as well as by a model-free approach, using an advanced isoconversional method. Both approaches correctly predict the time to completion of polymerization at a given temperature. The material prepared independently at the predicted temperature is characterized by electron microscopy and CO2 adsorption measurements and is confirmed to possess a microporous structure with a multimodal distribution of micropores with two major maxima at ~0.5 and 0.8 nm.
Keywords: cyanate esters; differential scanning calorimetry; isoconversional kinetic analysis; microporous polymers; polymerization kinetics; polytriazines.