About this family
A methacrylate is an acrylate carrying a methyl group on the substituted backbone carbon: –CH2–C(CH3)(CO2R)–. That one substituent is responsible for most of what the family is used for. It sits directly on the chain, and a backbone carbon bearing both a methyl and an ester cannot rotate past its neighbours without a large energy penalty, so the chain is stiff and the glass transition is high.
Poly(methyl methacrylate) is the reference point at 105 °C: hard, glass-clear, weatherable, and rigid enough to be sold as a sheet glazing material. The acrylate with the identical ester, poly(methyl acrylate), is a soft solid at 10 °C. Nothing distinguishes them but that methyl.
What sets the properties
The ester series behaves the way it does in the acrylates, just displaced upward. Poly(methyl methacrylate) at 105 °C falls to poly(ethyl methacrylate) at 65 °C, and continues down through the butyl and hexyl esters into the rubbery range. Ring-containing esters push the other way by adding their own stiffness – poly(cyclohexyl methacrylate) recovers to about 92 °C. Polar esters raise Tg through interchain attraction rather than sterics: poly(2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate) sits at 55 °C dry despite a flexible two-carbon ester, and poly(methacrylic acid) reaches 185 °C dry because every repeat unit can hydrogen-bond to its neighbour.
The same crowding that raises Tg also makes methacrylates unusual at high temperature. A methacrylate propagating radical is tertiary and comparatively stabilised, which lowers the propagation rate relative to an acrylate and largely suppresses the backbiting that broadens acrylate distributions – helpful for controlled polymerisation, and part of why methacrylates were among the first monomers polymerised well by ATRP and RAFT. It also lowers the ceiling temperature. Heated far enough, poly(methyl methacrylate) unzips cleanly back to monomer rather than charring, which is the basis of the depolymerisation route used to recycle acrylic sheet.
All 105 in the library
Sorted by parent name, ignoring the leading "poly" and any locants – so poly(2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate) files under H. 97 of the 105 carry a note, and every one is searchable by drawn structure on the structure search page. 11 have a CAS registry number for the polymer; most specialty polymers have never been assigned one, and the number you find in a catalogue is usually the monomer's, which is why the field is blank rather than borrowed here.
A
Poly(2-(acetoacetoxy)ethyl methacrylate)
The beta-ketoester side group chelates metal ions and condenses with amines to enamines at room temperature, which is how ambient-cure latex coatings crosslink without an oven or an isocyanate.
Poly(1-adamantyl methacrylate)
The adamantyl cage is rigid, transparent and unusually resistant to plasma etching, which is why adamantyl methacrylates are a standard component of 193 nm photoresist terpolymers.
Poly(allyl methacrylate)
A monomer with two very different double bonds: the methacrylate polymerises far faster than the allyl group, so the first stage gives a soluble polymer with pendant allyls that can be crosslinked afterwards.
Poly(2-aminoethyl methacrylate)
A primary-amine methacrylate, usually handled as the hydrochloride salt because the free base attacks its own ester. The pendant primary amines make it strongly cationic and readily conjugatable.
Poly(2-azidoethyl methacrylate)
Carries the other half of the click pair. The azide is stable to radical polymerisation but decomposes on heating, so these polymers are handled and stored cold.
B
Poly(behenyl methacrylate)
A twenty-two carbon side chain, long enough that side-chain crystallinity dominates entirely and the melting point reaches about 55 C. Polymers like this are used as wax crystal modifiers in diesel: the side chains co-crystallise with the paraffins that would otherwise form a gel, keeping the fuel flowing in cold weather.
Poly(benzyl methacrylate)
Poly(2-bromoethyl methacrylate)
A precursor polymer: the pendant primary bromide is displaced by azide, amine or thiolate to give side groups that could not survive the polymerisation directly.
Poly(2-(2-bromoisobutyryloxy)ethyl methacrylate)
An inimer: every repeat unit carries an ATRP initiating site. Polymerised first and then grown from, it gives molecular bottlebrushes with one side chain per backbone unit.
Poly(4-bromophenyl methacrylate)
The bromine gives a high refractive index and strong X-ray contrast, which is why brominated aryl methacrylates appear in optical and radiopaque formulations.
Poly(butyl methacrylate)
Poly(sec-butyl methacrylate)
The branch sits on the carbon next to the ester oxygen, which is the position that most restricts ester rotation - so this sits above the n-butyl and isobutyl isomers in Tg.
Poly(tert-butyl methacrylate)
Poly(2-(tert-butylamino)ethyl methacrylate)
A hindered secondary amine methacrylate. The bulk around the nitrogen lowers its basicity relative to the dialkylamino esters and makes the polymer antimicrobial rather than simply cationic.
Poly(4-tert-butylcyclohexyl methacrylate)
The tert-butyl group locks the cyclohexane ring into one chair, so the ester presents a fixed bulky face. Sold as cis/trans mixtures whose ratio shifts Tg by several degrees.
Poly(2-tert-butylphenyl methacrylate)
A bulky ortho substituent that hinders ester rotation and slows the hydrolysis that limits the aryl methacrylates, at the cost of a much lower propagation rate.
C
Poly(carboxybetaine methacrylate)
The other major zwitterionic antifouling polymer, with a carboxylate rather than a sulfonate paired to the quaternary ammonium. The shorter, harder anion binds water more tightly, which gives slightly better resistance to protein adsorption than the sulfobetaine; and unlike it, the carboxylate offers a handle for coupling a ligand, so a surface can be non-fouling and still specific.
Poly(cetyl methacrylate)
The C16 comb methacrylate. Side-chain crystallinity dominates its thermal behaviour, and the melting point tracks the alkyl length far more closely than anything about the backbone.
Poly(3-chloro-2-hydroxypropyl methacrylate)
The ring-opened form of glycidyl methacrylate. It carries both a hydroxyl and a displaceable chloride, and closes back to the epoxide on treatment with base.
Poly(2-chloroethyl methacrylate)
The chloride is a slower leaving group than the bromide, which makes this the more storage-stable of the two haloethyl methacrylates.
Poly(4-chlorophenyl methacrylate)
Ring chlorination raises both refractive index and Tg over poly(phenyl methacrylate); the halogen also makes the ester more susceptible to hydrolysis.
Poly(2-cyanoethyl methacrylate)
A high-dielectric methacrylate. The nitrile dipole raises permittivity sharply, which puts these polymers in capacitor films and in electrolyte binders.
Poly(cyclohexyl methacrylate)
Poly(cyclooctyl methacrylate)
The larger cycloaliphatic ester; the eight-membered ring is conformationally loose enough that it stiffens the polymer less than the compact cyclohexyl ester does.
Poly(cyclopentyl methacrylate)
A cycloaliphatic ester that raises Tg over the open-chain C5 isomers without the aromatic absorbance of the phenyl esters - useful in optical formulations.
D
Poly(decyl methacrylate)
The methacrylate at which the falling glass transition reaches its minimum and begins to reverse - beyond about ten to twelve carbons the side chains start to associate and crystallise, so adding more raises the transition again. It marks the turning point of the whole comb-polymer trend.
Poly(2-(diethylamino)ethyl methacrylate)
The diethyl relative of the standard cationic methacrylate, and about a pH unit less basic for it - which puts its transition from soluble polycation to insoluble neutral polymer near pH 7.3, right at the edge of physiological. That makes it the sharper pH switch of the pair, used where a carrier must collapse or open over a very small pH change.
Poly(2-(diisopropylamino)ethyl methacrylate)
Its side-chain pKa near 6.2 sits just below physiological pH, so the polymer switches from soluble to insoluble across the endosomal pH range - the basis of a large family of pH-responsive drug carriers.
Poly(dimethyl itaconate)
Itaconic acid comes from fermenting sugar with Aspergillus, so this is a bio-based route to a methacrylate-like polymer with no petrochemical monomer. The extra methylene between backbone and second ester makes the chain unusually stiff for an acrylic, with a glass transition near 90 C, and itaconate esters are the leading candidate to displace methyl methacrylate on renewable grounds.
Poly(2-(dimethylamino)ethyl methacrylate)
Poly(3-(dimethylamino)propyl methacrylate)
One methylene longer than the far more common 2-(dimethylamino)ethyl methacrylate, which puts the amine further from the ester and slows the base-catalysed hydrolysis that limits DMAEMA storage.
Poly(dimethylaminopropyl methacrylamide)
A tertiary amine on a methacrylamide rather than a methacrylate backbone, which matters because the amide will not hydrolyse the way the corresponding aminoethyl methacrylate does - a cationic polymer that stays cationic in water for years. It is used in hair conditioners and as a flocculant, and quaternises readily if a permanent charge is wanted.
Poly(2,6-dimethylphenyl methacrylate)
Both ortho positions are blocked, so the ring is held nearly perpendicular to the ester. That fixed twist gives one of the highest glass transitions among the alkyl-substituted aryl methacrylates.
E
Poly(2-ethoxyethyl methacrylate)
An ether-containing methacrylate whose flexible side chain gives low Tg and good adhesion to polar substrates.
Poly(ethyl methacrylate)
Poly(ethylene glycol dimethacrylate) network
The workhorse photocrosslinkable hydrogel: a PEG chain capped at both ends with a methacrylate, cured in seconds by light into a mesh whose pore size is set by the length of the PEG between crosslinks. That single tunable dimension is why it is the default scaffold for encapsulating cells and the base resin for most stereolithographic bioprinting. A network, so undrawn.
Poly(2-ethylhexyl methacrylate)
A methacrylate with a branched eight-carbon ester, which puts the glass transition around -10 C - soft where PMMA is hard, from the side group alone. The branch is what does it: a linear octyl ester of the same mass packs better and sits higher. Used where an acrylic needs to stay flexible, in pressure-sensitive adhesives and as the soft phase of acrylic block copolymers.
F
Poly(4-fluorophenyl methacrylate)
A singly fluorinated aryl ester. One fluorine is enough to make the ring an activated leaving group towards strong nucleophiles while leaving the polymer far less costly than the pentafluorophenyl version.
Poly(furfuryl methacrylate)
A methacrylate whose ester comes from furfural, which is made from corn cobs and bagasse rather than from oil. The furan ring is also a diene, so the polymer undergoes Diels-Alder addition with maleimides - and the adduct comes apart again on heating, which is the basis of self-healing and reworkable networks built from it.
G
Poly(geranyl methacrylate)
A bio-based methacrylate: the methacrylate ester of the terpene alcohol geraniol. The pendant geranyl group keeps its two C=C double bonds (2,6-diene), which remain available for post-polymerization crosslinking. Studied for greener coatings and binders. Monomer C14H22O2, ~222.3 g/mol.
Poly(glycerol monomethacrylate)
Two hydroxyls per repeat instead of the hydroxyethyl methacrylate's one, which makes it far more hydrophilic - water-soluble rather than merely swellable - and doubles the attachment points. It is the standard hydrophilic stabiliser block in aqueous polymerisation-induced self-assembly, where the growing hydrophobic block drives the particles out of solution as they form.
Poly(glycidyl methacrylate)
H
Poly(1H,1H,5H-octafluoropentyl methacrylate)
The terminal C-H distinguishes this from a fully perfluorinated ester: it keeps the side chains from packing into the crystalline bilayers that make the long perfluoroalkyl acrylates waxy.
Poly(heptyl methacrylate)
The seven-carbon term, sitting just past the middle of the n-alkyl methacrylate series where the glass transition is still falling and side-chain crystallisation has not yet begun. Together with the pentyl, hexyl and decyl members it maps the minimum of that curve.
Poly(2,2,3,4,4,4-hexafluorobutyl methacrylate)
A partially fluorinated methacrylate with a low refractive index and low surface energy, used in optical fibre cladding and in fluorinated block copolymers where a fully perfluorinated side chain would crystallise.
Poly(hexafluoroisopropyl methacrylate)
Six fluorines on the ester alcohol drop the refractive index to about 1.38, below any hydrocarbon polymer, which is what makes it a cladding for plastic optical fibre - light stays in the core because the sheath bends it less. The same fluorines make the neighbouring alcohol unusually acidic once the ester is cleaved, which is why the group also appears in photoresists.
Poly(hexyl methacrylate)
A middle term in the n-alkyl methacrylate series, where the glass transition falls steadily from PMMA's 105 C as the ester lengthens - internal plasticisation, the side chain diluting the backbone's own interactions. The trend reverses past about twelve carbons once the side chains begin to crystallise among themselves.
Poly(4-hydroxybutyl methacrylate)
The methacrylate version of the long-spacer hydroxy monomer, used to introduce crosslinkable hydroxyls into acrylic resins for isocyanate cure.
Poly(2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate)
Common hydrogel-forming polymer (contact lenses) once hydrated.
Poly(2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate-co-methyl methacrylate)
The chemistry of a soft contact lens, where the ratio sets water content directly: pure HEMA gives about 38 percent water and a lens too fragile to handle in the thinnest sections, and adding the more hydrophobic methacrylate trades water for strength. Every hydrogel lens material is a point on that trade. Not drawn: the ratio is the specification.
Poly(4-hydroxyphenyl methacrylate)
A phenol-bearing methacrylate. The hydroxyl is both a hydrogen-bond donor and a site for post-polymerisation esterification, and it makes the polymer soluble in aqueous base.
Poly(hydroxypropyl methacrylate)
The hydroxyethyl hydrogel monomer with one more carbon, which is enough to change its behaviour: the extra methyl makes the polymer hydrophobic enough to be water-insoluble while still swelling, and it shows a lower critical solution temperature the hydroxyethyl version does not. Widely used as the drug-carrying block of HPMA copolymer conjugates.
I
Poly(isoamyl methacrylate)
The C5 branched ester, used where a slightly softer film than poly(butyl methacrylate) is wanted without going to the long-chain grades.
Poly(isobornyl methacrylate)
A methacrylate with a rigid bicyclic cage where the ester alkyl usually is, which pushes the glass transition to about 180 C - some 70 degrees above PMMA - without any aromatic ring. The camphene it comes from is a turpentine derivative, so it is the rare case of a bio-based monomer that raises rather than lowers the service temperature.
Poly(isobutyl methacrylate)
The branched isomer of poly(butyl methacrylate), and about 30 C higher in glass transition because the branch resists the rotation that a straight butyl chain allows freely. The two are a clean demonstration that side-chain shape, not just length, sets where a polymer softens.
Poly(2-isocyanatoethyl methacrylate)
Carries an isocyanate through a radical polymerisation, giving a polymer that couples to alcohols, amines and thiols without a coupling agent. It has to be kept rigorously dry - water converts the pendant NCO to an amine, which then crosslinks the chain it came from.
Poly(isodecyl methacrylate)
A long-tail methacrylate whose side chain is branched enough not to crystallise, so it stays a soft rubber down to about -60 C. Comb polymers of this kind are the backbone of viscosity index improvers in motor oil: the side chains stay collapsed in cold oil and extend as it warms, offsetting the thinning that would otherwise occur.
Poly(isopropyl methacrylate)
Branching the same three carbons raises Tg well above the n-propyl isomer: a compact branched ester cannot pack into the chain the way a flexible n-propyl one can, so it stiffens rather than plasticises.
L
Poly(lauryl methacrylate)
A methacrylate with a twelve-carbon tail, which makes it soluble in hydrocarbons and useless in water - the opposite of most of the family. That oil solubility is the point: it is the stabilising block of dispersion polymerisations run in alkanes and the backbone of viscosity index improvers for engine oil, where the coil expands as the oil thins with temperature and offsets the drop in viscosity.
M
Poly(m-tolyl methacrylate)
The meta isomer sits between the ortho and para members: enough asymmetry to disrupt packing, not enough steric crowding to lock the ring.
Poly(methacrylamide)
Polyacrylamide with an alpha-methyl, which raises the glass transition far above the parent and makes the polymer stiffer and more hydrolytically stable. It is the amide term in the acrylate/methacrylate/acrylamide/methacrylamide grid that gets used to separate the effect of the backbone methyl from the effect of the side group.
Poly(methacrylic acid)
Poly(2-(methacryloyloxy)ethyl trimethylammonium chloride)
A permanently charged polycation - the quaternary ammonium does not titrate, so the charge density is the same at any pH. Used in antimicrobial coatings, in flocculants and as the grafted brush that gives surfaces a strong, pH-independent surface charge. The chloride counter-ion is not drawn.
Poly(2-methacryloyloxyethyl phosphorylcholine)
A polymer that copies the outside of a cell membrane. The phosphorylcholine head group is the one presented by phosphatidylcholine on the outer leaflet, and a surface covered in it is very poorly recognised by proteins - so PMPC coatings resist fouling and clotting better than PEG does, and hold water so tightly that they lubricate. It is the coating on some hip implants and contact lenses. Zwitterionic rather than charged overall, which is why it does not attract counter-ions the way a polyelectrolyte does.
Poly(2-(2-methoxyethoxy)ethyl methacrylate)
The two-unit oligoethylene glycol methacrylate. Its aqueous LCST sits near 26 C, and copolymerising it with longer OEG methacrylates tunes the cloud point continuously - the non-acrylamide alternative to poly(N-isopropylacrylamide).
Poly(4-methoxyphenyl methacrylate)
An electron-rich aryl ester. The methoxy group raises the refractive index and shifts the absorption edge, which is what these substituted phenyl methacrylates are made for.
Methyl methacrylate butadiene styrene
A core-shell impact modifier whose shell is chosen to match the refractive index of the matrix it toughens - which is why rigid PVC and polycarbonate can be made impact-resistant and remain transparent. Without that index match the rubber particles would scatter light and the part would be translucent. Not drawn: a core-shell particle, not a chain.
Poly(methyl methacrylate)
Commercial PMMA is atactic and amorphous (Tg only); the 220 °C melting point in Odian's Table 1-3 refers to the crystalline stereoregular form.
Poly(2-(methylthio)ethyl methacrylate)
A thioether methacrylate. Sulfur raises the refractive index more per atom than oxygen does, and the thioether oxidises to a sulfoxide, which turns a hydrophobic polymer hydrophilic - the basis of oxidation-responsive carriers.
Poly(myristyl methacrylate)
A comb polymer whose C14 side chains crystallise like a paraffin wax. Grades in this range are used to modify the wax crystal habit in fuels and lubricating oils.
N
Poly(1-naphthyl methacrylate)
The 1-substituted naphthyl ester is more crowded than the 2-isomer already in this library, which raises Tg and changes the excimer emission the naphthyl polymers are studied for.
Poly(2-naphthyl methacrylate)
A methacrylate carrying a fused aromatic, giving a refractive index near 1.62 - high for an acrylic - and a fluorescent label built into every repeat unit. Naphthalene forms excimers when two rings stack, so the ratio of monomer to excimer emission reports directly on how tightly the chain is coiled, which is why this polymer turns up in conformational studies rather than in products.
Poly(neopentyl methacrylate)
A quaternary carbon two bonds from the ester oxygen. The tert-butyl cap cannot rotate its way out of the chain's path, so the polymer is stiffer than any linear C5 ester.
Poly(nonyl methacrylate)
Near the minimum of the Tg-versus-side-chain-length curve for n-alkyl methacrylates, where the side chains are long enough to plasticise fully but still too short to crystallise.
O
Poly(octyl methacrylate)
Deep into the soft end of the n-alkyl methacrylate series - a tacky, low-Tg polymer used as a comonomer to soften harder methacrylate films.
Poly(oligo(ethylene glycol) methyl ether methacrylate)
The bottlebrush most people actually use, and the one that needs no special chemistry to make. The monomer is sold ready-made as a methacrylate carrying a short methyl-capped PEG tail, so an ordinary radical polymerisation of it gives a brush directly - no macromonomer synthesis, no metathesis catalyst. Grafting density is perfect by construction because every repeat is a macromonomer. Short tails (n of about 4 to 9) give a comb rather than a true brush, and the transition is gradual, which is why the same material gets called both. Sold as OEGMA300 and OEGMA500 after the tail's nominal mass; the CAS is for the monomer, since the polymer is defined by whichever tail length was bought. Widely used as a non-fouling, PEG-like coating where the polyether has to stay attached to something.
P
Poly(pentafluorobenzyl methacrylate)
The methylene spacer makes this a stable ester rather than the activated one that pentafluorophenyl methacrylate is, so the fluorinated ring stays on the chain instead of being displaced by amines.
Poly(pentafluorophenyl methacrylate)
An activated ester polymer. The pentafluorophenoxide is a good leaving group, so the whole chain can be converted to amides by simply stirring it with an amine - the standard route to a library of methacrylamides from one parent polymer.
Poly(2,2,3,3,3-pentafluoropropyl methacrylate)
A low-surface-energy methacrylate used in optical cladding and release coatings; the fluorine content drops the refractive index well below that of PMMA.
Poly(pentyl methacrylate)
The five-carbon term of the n-alkyl methacrylate series, filling the gap between butyl and hexyl in the steady fall of glass transition with ester length. The series exists in the library precisely so the trend can be read off rather than asserted.
Poly(perfluorooctylethyl methacrylate)
The methacrylate counterpart of the acrylate already in this library. Side chains this long crystallise into a smectic bilayer that presents only CF3 groups at the surface, which is what gives these polymers their very low surface energy - and what makes the effect disappear above the side-chain melting point.
Poly(2-phenoxyethyl methacrylate)
An aromatic ether ester with a high refractive index and good adhesion to polar substrates. The ether oxygen between the ring and the backbone gives it far more chain mobility than poly(phenyl methacrylate) at a similar aromatic content.
Poly(phenyl methacrylate)
An aryl ester rather than an alkyl one, which stiffens the side chain and lifts the glass transition to about 110 C while raising the refractive index well above PMMA's. Aromatic methacrylates are how an acrylic is given the index needed for optical adhesives and high-index lenses without leaving the family.
Poly(2-phenylethyl methacrylate)
A two-carbon spacer between backbone and ring gives a high refractive index with more chain mobility than benzyl or phenyl methacrylate.
Poly(propargyl methacrylate)
A clickable methacrylate. The pendant terminal alkyne survives radical polymerisation and is then available for copper-catalysed azide-alkyne cycloaddition.
Poly(propyl methacrylate)
The C3 member of the n-alkyl methacrylate series, between poly(ethyl methacrylate) and poly(butyl methacrylate). Each added methylene in the ester group pushes the side chains apart and drops Tg - the standard demonstration of internal plasticisation.
S
Poly(stearyl methacrylate)
The far end of the n-alkyl methacrylate series, where the eighteen-carbon side chains pack into their own crystalline domains and melt near 35 C independently of the backbone. Comb polymers like this are the active ingredient in pour-point depressants: the side chains co-crystallise with the wax in a fuel and stop it forming a continuous network.
Poly(N-succinimidyl methacrylate)
An activated-ester polymer whose side groups react cleanly with primary amines. Together with the pentafluorophenyl esters it is the standard way to make a set of methacrylamides from a single well-characterised parent chain.
Poly(sulfobetaine methacrylate)
A zwitterion with the two charges on the same side chain, quaternary ammonium and sulfonate a few carbons apart. Because the charges pair with each other rather than with salt, it behaves backwards from an ordinary polyelectrolyte: adding salt breaks the intra-chain pairs and makes it MORE soluble, so it has an upper critical solution temperature and dissolves on heating. Used for antifouling coatings where the hydration layer, not steric repulsion, does the work.
Poly(2-sulfoethyl methacrylate)
A strong-acid methacrylate. Unlike the carboxylic acid monomers it stays fully ionised at any pH, so the polyelectrolyte behaviour does not change with the buffer.
Poly(3-sulfopropyl methacrylate)
A strong polyacid tethered to a methacrylate backbone through a three-carbon spacer, so the charge sits well clear of the chain and stays dissociated at every pH. Grafted from a surface it forms polyelectrolyte brushes with remarkably low friction in water - the hydration layer around each sulfonate is what slides - which is the model system for how cartilage lubricates.
T
Poly(2,2,3,3-tetrafluoropropyl methacrylate)
A partially fluorinated methacrylate. The low refractive index and surface energy come with a C-H bond at the end of the chain, so it is less inert than the fully fluorinated esters.
Poly(tetrahydrofurfuryl methacrylate)
A cyclic ether ester used in dental and bone-cement formulations, where its polarity improves wetting of the mineral phase over plain alkyl methacrylates.
Poly(tetrahydrogeranyl methacrylate)
The fully hydrogenated version of poly(geranyl methacrylate): the ester of tetrahydrogeraniol (3,7-dimethyl-1-octanol), so the branched C10 pendant is saturated with no residual C=C. A bio-derived, flexible, hydrophobic side group. Monomer C14H26O2, ~226.4 g/mol.
Poly(2-tetrahydropyranyl methacrylate)
An acid-labile protected methacrylic acid. A trace of photogenerated acid cleaves the tetrahydropyranyl ether and the polymer switches from base-insoluble to base-soluble - the chemically amplified resist mechanism that made deep-UV lithography practical.
Poly(o-tolyl methacrylate)
The ortho methyl twists the ring out of plane with the ester, hindering rotation - the classic demonstration that substituent position, not just size, sets Tg in aryl methacrylates.
Poly(p-tolyl methacrylate)
The para methyl adds bulk without breaking ring symmetry, so this packs more regularly than the ortho and meta isomers and has the highest Tg of the three.
Poly(tridecyl methacrylate)
Side-chain crystallisation is established by this length, so the useful transition is the side-chain Tm rather than the backbone Tg - the basis of the comb-like polymers used as pour-point depressants.
Poly(3-(triethoxysilyl)propyl methacrylate)
The triethoxy silane hydrolyses more slowly than the trimethoxy version and releases ethanol rather than methanol, which is why it is preferred where the cure has to be controlled or the by-product matters.
Poly(trifluoroethyl methacrylate)
A methacrylate carrying a fluorinated ester, which drops the refractive index well below PMMA's while keeping the same processability. That is exactly what a plastic optical fibre cladding needs: a low-index skin on a PMMA core so light totally internally reflects. The fluorine also lowers the surface energy, so it doubles as a low-adhesion coating.
Poly(3-(trimethoxysilyl)propyl methacrylate)
The adhesion promoter used to bond acrylic resins to glass and silica: the methacrylate copolymerises into the organic phase while the trimethoxysilane hydrolyses and condenses onto the mineral surface.
Poly(trimethylsilyl methacrylate)
A protected form of poly(methacrylic acid): the silyl ester hydrolyses readily, so the polymer is made in a form that dissolves in hydrocarbons and is converted to the acid afterwards.
Poly(2-(trimethylsilyloxy)ethyl methacrylate)
Protected 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate. The silyl ether keeps the hydroxyl out of the way during anionic or controlled radical polymerisation, then comes off with fluoride or dilute acid to give clean pHEMA.
U
Poly(undecyl methacrylate)
Long enough that the side chains begin to order among themselves; the C12 lauryl and longer members show a genuine side-chain melting transition rather than a simple Tg.
V
Poly(vinyl methacrylate)
Two double bonds of very different reactivity on one small monomer: the methacrylate consumes first, leaving pendant vinyl esters that crosslink in a second, slower stage.