オレフィン重合触媒開発・触媒表面観察・計算化学シミュレーション

抄録

Isotactic polypropylene (PP) is one of the most useful plastics for modern human life. Saving energy and resources is the most important issue of the PP production. Nowadays, PP is mainly produced by gas phase process with sophisticated heterogeneous catalysts in industry. First, the history of development of PP manufacturing process is briefly reviewed and second, development of heterogeneous polymerization catalysts, studies of polymerization mechanism, are described. The importance of characterization of catalysts, especially TEM, SEM, and EDX is impressed. Simulation of polymerization based on an atomistic modeling of active sites is necessary for catalyst development to get rational working hypotheses. Finally, cluster model approach for clarifying roles of doner compounds in MgCl₂ supported catalysts is presented.