Polymers have for too long been a fundamental portion of our everyday lives a case in point that examples are available almost ubiquitously. We generally have an impression which leads us to trust that polymers are only plastics employed for packaging, in household objects as well as for making fibres, but this is simply the tip in the iceberg.
Polymers are widely-used in all sorts of applications you may not have thought much about. This blog enlightens you regarding the story behind polymers and how they have evolved since that time to serve several functions across numerous industries.
Origin of polymer science
Humans took benefit of the versatility of polymers for hundreds of years in the form of oils, tars, resins and gums. However, it wasn’t prior to the industrial revolution how the polymer industry started to realize. Actually, the birth of polymer science might be traced time for the mid-nineteenth century. Within the 1830s, Charles Goodyear developed the vulcanization method that transformed the sticky latex of natural rubber right into a useful elastomer for tire use. In 1909, Leo Hendrik Baekeland created a resin from two quite typical chemicals, phenol and formaldehyde. The response between these two chemicals led the way to build up a resin, called Bakelite, named after him. It was this resin that served as a harbinger to many in the common polymers that individuals use today. The phrase “polymer” comes from the Greek roots “poly” and “mer,” which assembled means “many parts.” Polymeric substances are composed of many chemical units called monomers, that happen to be joined together into large molecular chains comprising 1000s of atoms.
Classification of polymers
Judging by their origin, polymethyl methacrylate can be viewed as synthetic or natural polymers. Natural polymers are the type polymers that exist in nature knowning that that happen to be isolated from plant and animal resources. Starch, cellulose, proteins, natural rubber etc. are several types of natural polymers. Though they are processed to get the result, considering that the basic material comes from a natural source, these polymers are referred to as natural polymers. Natural rubber coming from tree latex it’s essentially a polymer made from isoprene units which has a portion of impurities in it.
With this context, biopolymers can also be significant. There is certainly large number of biopolymers such as polysaccharides, polyesters, and polyamides. They’re naturally created by microorganisms. The genetic manipulation of microorganisms makes means for enormous possibility of the biotechnological manufacture of biopolymers with tailored properties suited to high-value medical application such as tissue engineering and drug delivery.
Synthetic polymers, as their name indicates, are synthesized within the laboratory or factory by having a group of chemical reactions from low molecular weight compounds. From the functional point of view they may be classified into four main categories: thermoplastics, thermosets, elastomers and synthetic fibres. Polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) is one such thermoplastic created by the polymerization in the monomer, methyl methacrylate (MMA). PMMA is frequently called acrylic plastic and lends its properties with a number of consumer product applications. Being both a thermoplastic and transparent plastic, acrylic is employed extensively within the automotive industry in trunk release handles, master cylinder, and dashboard lighting. Consumer products that have a very constituent portion of acrylic plastic include aquariums, motorcycle helmet lenses, paint, furniture, picture framing, and umbrella clamps, and others.
A few of the other synthetic polymers that individuals use within us include Nylons, utilized in fabrics and textiles, Teflon, utilized in non-stick pans and Polyvinyl Chloride, utilized in pipes.
As being a leading manufacturer of SUMIPEX® PMMA polymer, Sumitomo Chemical is pleased to help you understand its properties as a synthetic polymer. To know more, contact us here.
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