5 Series of chiral-achiral N-propargylamide copolymers were synthesized

providing copolymers with moderate number-average molecular weights in high yields.For the copolymers from the achiral monomers with appropriate bulky pendent groups

the moderate steric hindrance between the pendent groups enabled the copolymer main chains to adopt helices preferring the same handed screw sense taken by the chiral units;the corresponding copolymers exhibited higher CD signal intensity even when compared with the pure chiral polymer.However

for the achiral co-monomers with too small or too large pendent groups

they were unfavorable for the resulting copolymers to prefer the helical handedness adopted by the chiral units

leading to low CD signal intensity.These findings would be helpful for us to design and synthesize novel helical N-propargylamide poly- and copolymers with high optical activity.