Ping-pong polymerization by allylation and hydroformylation for alternating vinyl alcohol-vinyl monomer copolymersElectronic supplementary information (ESI) available: Experimental procedures, supplementary experiments, and spectra for new polymers and compounds. See DOI: 10.1039/c2cc34980a

Inspired by the enzymatic ping-pong mechanism, we designed a novel "ping-pong polymerization", which employs allylation and hydroformylation in an iterative and alternating manner. Thus, alternating and regioregular vinyl alcohol-vinyl monomer copolymers possessing multiple hydroxy groups in a periodical manner were successfully synthesized. A novel ping-pong polymerization by allylation and hydroformylation was developed to obtain alternating and regioregular vinyl alcohol-vinyl monomer copolymers.