Polymers are huge macromolecules composed of repeating structural units. While polymer in popular usage suggests plastic, the term actually refers to a large class of natural and synthetic materials. Due to the extraordinary range of properties accessible, polymers have come to play an essential and ubiquitous role in everyday life - from plastics and elastomers on the one hand to natural biopolymers such as DNA and proteins on the other hand. The study of polymer science begins with understanding the methods in which these materials are synthesized. Polymer synthesis is a complex procedure and can take place in a variety of ways. This book brings together the 'Who is who' of polymer science to give the readers an overview of the large field of polymer synthesis. It is a one-stop reference and a must-have for all Chemists, Polymer Chemists, Chemists in Industry, and Materials Scientists.


A. Dieter Schluter is since 2004 Professor for polymer chemistry at the Materials Department of the ETH Zurich. He studied chemistry and geophysics at the University of Munich and received in 1984 his PhD under the supervision of Prof. G. Szeimies. After post-doctoral fellowships with Prof. K. P.C. Vollhardt (UC Berkeley, USA) and Prof. W.J. Feast (University of Durham, UK) he was head of the polymer synthesis research group in Prof. G. Wegner's department at the Max-Planck-Institut fur Polymerforschung (Mainz, Germany). 1991 he finished his habilitation, received a scholarship award of the Fonds der Chemischen Industrie and started as Professor for polymer chemistry at the
University of Karlsruhe. From 1992 to 2004 he was Full Professor at the Free University of Berlin. Since 2012 he is an elected personal member of the Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences. His research interests are in the area of polymer synthesis with a visible component of organic chemistry.

Craig J. Hawker, FRS received his BSc (1984) degree from Queensland, Australia his PhD (1988) degree from the Cambridge (UK), followed by a post-doctoral fellowship with Professor Jean M.J. Frechet at Cornell from 1988 to 1990. In 2005 he moved from the IBM Almaden Research Center to the University of California, Santa Barbara where he is the Heeger Chair of Interdisciplinary Science. He is also the Director of the Materials Research Laboratory, founding Director of the Dow Materials Institute and visiting Chair Professor at King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals. His research activities focus on synthetic polymer chemistry and nanotechnology and has led to
more than 45 patents and over 300 papers. He has received a number of awards for his work and in 2010 he was named as a Fellow of the Royal Society.

Junji Sakamoto is currently a Habilitand at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich. Born in Kyoto, Japan in 1973, he studied chemistry and polymer science at Kyoto University, and earned his PhD in 2002 on the synthesis of polysaccharides under the supervision of Prof. S. Kobayashi. He carried out his postdoctoral research with Prof. K. Mullen at the Max-Planck-Institute for Polymer Research in Mainz, Germany, working on the synthesis of dendrimers (2002-2004). He then moved to the group of Prof. A.D. Schluter at ETH Zurich, Switzerland, working on the synthesis of macrocycles, where since 2006 he has been a group leader for 2D polymers, Suzuki polycondensation and new polymerization methodology leading to unprecedented structures.