The world is drowning in plastic waste. Our bodies are full of microplastics and no environment is safe. Plastics are strewn atop the most remote mountains, the deepest parts of the sea, and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is so prominent that it has become a proper noun and its own ecosystem.
Polyethylene, the world’s most-produced plastic, provides us with bags, food packaging, and household goods containers. It’s also especially polluting because it’s designed to be sturdy and long-lasting.
Yet the future holds promise, because chemical engineers at the University of Surrey in the United Kingdom have created a unique new plastic with the qualities needed to support a more cyclical materials economy.
As they report in the journal Macromolecules, this proof-of-concept polymer readily breaks down into a gas when heated. And then, like the mythical Phoenix, rises from the ‘ashes’ to reassemble itself.
“Most plastics are designed to be stable, which is exactly what makes them difficult to remove or recycle,” explains Peter Roth, chemical engineer at the University of Surrey.
“We’ve shown that it’s possible to create a material that behaves very differently – one that can transform into vapor at relatively low temperatures before naturally rebuilding itself into the same polymer.”
This novel polymer is called poly(1,2-dithiolane), meaning that it’s a chain made of individual links, or monomers, of 1,2-dithiolane, a ring-like molecule made of carbon, hydrogen, and two linked sulfur atoms.
The reversible nature of this sulfur link makes the polymer readily and repeatedly degradable.
“This isn’t a replacement for conventional plastics, and it’s certainly not a solution to the global plastic waste problem. But it does introduce a new concept that could inspire an entirely new generation of circular materials,” Roth adds.
(Yahoo News)
