Patent ID: 7074870

Claim:
A process for the production of a styrene polymer, comprising reacting a styrene or substituted styrene monomer in the presence of a catalyst under polymerization conditions, said catalyst formed from a composition comprising a ligand and metal precursor, wherein said ligand is characterized by the following formula: wherein X 1 and X 2 are N, and X 3 , X 4 , and X 5 are independently selected from the group consisting of N and CR 15 , where R 15 is selected from the group consisting of hydrogen, alkyl, substituted alkyl, cycloalkyl, substituted cycloalkyl, heterocycloalkyl, substituted heterocycloalkyl, aryl, substituted aryl, heteroaryl, substituted heteroaryl, alkoxy, aryloxy, silyl, boryl, phosphino, amino, thio, seleno, and combinations thereof, provided that at least one and not more than two of X 3 , X 4 , and X 5 are N; optionally, X 3 and X 4 may be joined to form a fused ring system having up to 50 atoms, not counting hydrogen atoms; and R 1 , R 2 ; R 3 and R 4 are independently selected from the group consisting of hydrogen, alkyl, substituted alkyl, cycloalkyl, substituted cycloalkyl, heteroalkyl, substituted heteroalkyl, heterocycloalkyl, substituted heterocycloalkyl, aryl, substituted aryl, heteroaryl, substituted heteroaryl, alkoxy, aryloxy, halo, silyl, boryl, phosphino, amino, thio, seleno, nitro, and combinations thereof, with the exception that R 1 may not be hydrogen, and optionally two or more of R 1 , R 2 , R 3 and R 4 may be joined to form a fused ring system having up to 50 atoms, not counting hydrogen atoms; and wherein said metal precursor comprises a group 4 metal.