EAGER: CAS: Recyclable Polystyrene-Substitutes through On-demand Depolymerization

EAGER：CAS：通过按需解聚可回收聚苯乙烯替代品

• 批准号: 2029765
• 负责人: Sangwoo Lee
• 金额: $ 30万
• 依托单位: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-08-01 至 2024-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2029765&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: EAGER; CAS; Recyclable; Polystyrene; Substitutes

NON-TECHNICAL SUMMARY:The overall goal of this research is to establish recyclable thermoplastics that are based on polystyrene-substitute materials since plastics made of polystyrene itself are not commonly recycled. Polymers are an essential material class used in nearly all modern products. However, most of the used polymer products are landfilled, improperly discarded, or incinerated and thus have environmental consequences. The high-cost problem of polymer recycling suggests the desirability to develop new polymers with low-cost and facile recyclability without compromising physical properties needed for practical applications. This research aims to establish a new class of recyclable thermoplastics that can effectively substitute polystyrene. Polystyrene is one of the largest produced thermoplastic polymers used as a key component for numerous commodity and specialty applications. However, polystyrene has been barely recycled due to high cost. The proposed research will replace non-recyclable polystyrene with new high-performance thermoplastics that can be recycled from used products at low cost. This research will significantly benefit society by establishing polystyrene-substituting recyclable thermoplastics that could remedy the environmental problems caused by polystyrene wastes. The planned work also includes educational activities for K-12 and undergraduate students to enhance their exposure and understanding of STEM fields with a focus on polymers and materials structures. TECHNICAL SUMMARY:The planned research aims to establish and study recyclable thermoplastic polymers as polystyrene substitutes through implementing low-cost and facile depolymerizability. The depolymerizability will be achieved by copolymerizing monomer with a low-ceiling temperature and other monomer that controls the properties of polymers. A library of recyclable copolymers will be synthesized, depolymerization characteristics of the polymer library will be studied, and optical and viscoelastic properties of the copolymers will be characterized for evaluation of the new polymers as polystyrene substitutes and beyond. These efforts will establish the correlations between the chemical composition of the copolymers and the physical/depolymerization properties. The established correlations of recyclable copolymers will serve as the design criteria of polymers for target applications. The project will provide graduate and undergraduate students with broad research training on polymers ranging from synthesis to characterization and materials properties..This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

非技术总结：本研究的总体目标是建立基于聚苯乙烯替代材料的可回收热塑性塑料，因为聚苯乙烯本身制成的塑料通常不回收。聚合物是几乎所有现代产品中使用的基本材料类别。然而，大多数使用过的聚合物产品被填埋、不适当地丢弃或焚烧，因此具有环境后果。聚合物回收的高成本问题表明需要开发具有低成本和易于回收性的新聚合物，而不损害实际应用所需的物理性能。这项研究旨在建立一种新的可回收热塑性塑料，可以有效地取代聚苯乙烯。聚苯乙烯是产量最大的热塑性聚合物之一，是众多商品和特种应用的关键组分。然而，由于成本高，聚苯乙烯几乎没有回收。拟议的研究将用新的高性能热塑性塑料取代不可回收的聚苯乙烯，这些热塑性塑料可以以低成本从旧产品中回收。这项研究将通过建立取代聚苯乙烯的可回收热塑性塑料来弥补聚苯乙烯废物造成的环境问题，从而显着造福社会。计划中的工作还包括为K-12和本科生举办的教育活动，以提高他们对STEM领域的了解和认识，重点是聚合物和材料结构。技术总结：计划的研究旨在通过实施低成本和易解聚性来建立和研究可回收的热塑性聚合物作为聚苯乙烯替代品。解聚性将通过具有低上限温度的单体与控制聚合物性质的其它单体共聚来实现。 将合成一个可回收共聚物库，将研究聚合物库的解聚特性，并表征共聚物的光学和粘弹性能，以评价新聚合物作为聚苯乙烯替代品及其他。这些努力将建立共聚物的化学组成和物理/解聚性质之间的相关性。建立的可回收共聚物的相关性将作为目标应用的聚合物的设计标准。该项目将为研究生和本科生提供广泛的聚合物研究培训，从合成到表征和材料性能。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并被认为是值得通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估的支持。

项目成果

Superacid-Assisted Degradation of Polystyrene

超强酸辅助降解聚苯乙烯

• DOI: 10.1021/acs.macromol.3c00602
• 发表时间: 2023
• 期刊: Macromolecules
• 影响因子: 5.5
• 作者: Thigale, Atharwa;Trant, Carrie;Ahn, Juhong;Nelson, Melissa;Ryu, Chang Y.;Bae, Chulsung;Lee, Sangwoo
• 通讯作者: Lee, Sangwoo