Swiss scientists reported in the British journal Nature · Communications on the 24th that a new method of producing plastic polymers can obtain bioplastics with similar properties to traditional plastics, but more sustainable, and the process takes only 30 minutes. The research shows that bioplastics based on renewable resources. — Bottle grade polyethylene furanoate, has been able to obtain in a very short time.

In 2018, the United Nations Environment Programme focused on single-use plastic pollution for the first time, and the theme of this year's World Environment Day is "Plastic War Quick", because our planet is surrounded by plastic. More than 79,000 tons of plastic waste are currently floating in the giant ocean plastic dump between California and Hawaii. According to the UN Environment Programme, if unchecked, there will be more plastic than fish in the oceans by 2050.

Compared to conventional plastics, sustainable polymers often have poor properties, including discoloration and thermal degradation, which are not suitable for specific everyday applications. Scientists believe that polyethylfuranoate has some potential, but it will begin to degrade after formation, because of the very long reaction time during production.

This time, Massimo ·, a scientist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich; Morbidelli and colleagues proposed a ring-opening polymerization method to form long straight chains of bottle-grade polyvinyl furanoate. According to this method, a high-boiling solvent is first used to make the initial material. — Smaller cyclic polyvinyl furanoate chains are mixed with tin-based catalysts; Once the polymer product begins to form, it melts under reaction conditions, facilitating the initial material conversion.

According to the research team, the reaction can be completed in 30 minutes using this method, and the resulting polyvinyl furanoate has the required properties, and the problems of degradation and discoloration have been minimized.

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