Alternating copolymerization of ethylene and 1-octene with meso-[dimethylsilylbis(2-methyl-1-indeny)]zirconium dichloride-methylaluminoxane as catalyst system

Copolymerizations of ethylene and a-olefins with homogeneous metallocene catalysts generally give the corresponding random copolymers with narrow molecular mass distributions. In this study, we have conducted the copolymerization sf ethylene and 1-octene with the meso-Me2Si(2-Me-1-Ind)(2)ZrCl2-methylaluminoxane (MAO) catalyst system, and analyzed the microstructure of the resulting copolymers in detail. The content of the alternating [EO] sequence increases markedly with an increase in the feed ratio of 1-octene to ethylene, reaching over 95% under appropriate copolymerization conditions. We have thus succeeded in preparing the first sample of alternating olefin copolymers.