The objective of this work was to develop a kind of new polymer with high hydrophobicities and good thermal stabilities.The introduction of fluorine into poly(arylene ether) is regarded as an effective way.A partially fluorinated poly(arylene ether) containing fluorenyl groups was successfully synthesized by aromatic nucleophilic substituting polycondensation from bisphenols and decafluorobiphenyl at 120℃

and the structure of the polymer was characterized by 1H-NMR.Number-average molecular weight characterized by GPC was 4.63×104 Da.The DSC and TGA measurements of the polymer were performed under a nitrogen atmosphere

and the results showed that the polymer exhibited good thermal stabilities with high Tg of 271℃ and 5% mass loss at 420℃.Moreover

the polymer was very soluble in common organic solvents

such as CH2Cl2

CHCl3

dimethyl sulfoxide

N

N′-dimethylacetamide

and could be readily cast into tough and smooth films from solutions.The films also showed high contact angles of water.Contact angle of the film cast by CHCl3 is 102°.Contact angle of the film cast by THF is 107°

which is close to that of Teflon (112°)

indicating that the polymer has high hydrophobicities.The polymer synthesized may have a promising prospect in microelectronic devices

such as the substrate for printed boards

and insulating materials as interlayer dielectrics and intermetal dielectrics.