A highly transparent and thermally stable copolymer of 1-adamantyl methacrylate and styrene

Thermal and optical properties of copolymers of 1‐adamantyl methacrylate (AdMA) and styrene (St) are investigated. The azeotropic copolymer with a glass transition temperature of 170 °C proves to be intrinsically more transparent than polystyrene. Thermal and optical properties of copolymers of 1‐adamantyl methacrylate (AdMA) and styrene (St) prepared by free radical polymerization in the bulk are investigated. The copolymer forms an azeotrope when the composition is AdMA/St = 55/45 mol%. The glass transition temperature and decomposition temperature of the azeotropic copolymer are 170 and ca 340 °C, respectively. The refractive index increases nonlinearly with St content from 1.522 to 1.591. The light scattering loss at 633 nm is 28.1 dB km−1, which is less than half of that of polystyrene. The total optical loss including molecular vibrational absorption, which is evaluated using a copolymer‐based optical fiber, is 292–645 dB km−1 at 500–700 nm. These values correspond to transmittances of 86–93% for a 1 m optical path length. © 2014 Society of Chemical Industry