Dehydration Polymerization for Poly(hetero)arene Conjugated Polymers

The lack of scalable and sustainable methods to prepare conjugated polymers belies their importance in many enabling technologies. Accessing high‐performance poly(hetero)arene conjugated polymers by dehydration has remained an unsolved problem in synthetic chemistry and has historically required transitional‐metal coupling reactions. Herein, we report a dehydration method that allows access to conjugated heterocyclic materials. By using the technique, we have prepared a series of small molecules and polymers. The reaction avoids using transition metals, proceeds at room temperature, the only required reactant is a simple base and water is the sole by‐product. The dehydration reaction is technically simple and provides a sustainable and straightforward method to prepare conjugated heteroarene motifs.