PFI-TT: A non-toxic, biobased, and recyclable polyurethane for foam-in-place packaging and rigid foam insulation.

这个创新技术转化伙伴关系（PFI-TT）项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力是将包装、绝缘和建筑市场中的聚氨酯泡沫从有毒到良性的生产顺序转变。聚氨酯是世界上产量排名第六的塑料，但在生产过程中使用致癌、诱变和生殖毒素。该项目结合了100%生物基来源和无毒成分来合成聚氨酯泡沫，可以在其使用寿命结束时回收回其原始材料。减少环境中的塑料废物和消除致癌物质的使用是许多行业所期望的理想。然而，在包装应用中使用一次性塑料以及用于绝缘的泡沫使得聚氨酯工业特别关注环境。该项目解决了从石油基原料向生物基原料过渡的需求，并在各种商业平台上实现了无毒聚氨酯的工业可行工艺。该项目的成功成果将通过创新聚氨酯循环生命周期的新路线，为聚氨酯行业带来彻底的转变。该项目旨在实现生物基非异氰酸酯聚氨酯的室温发泡和固化方案。聚氨酯由多元醇和异氰酸酯制成；异氰酸酯是一种致癌、致突变和生殖毒素（CMR），具有重大的健康和安全危险。由于无法使新的非异氰酸酯化学物质适应工业和商业应用中通常使用的加工条件，工业中的非异氰酸酯配方目前非常有限。为了创造反应性生物基前体用于合成，还原性催化分馏（RCF）将用于木质原料，以提取富含双功能芳香族化合物的油，这些化合物能够与环状碳酸盐官能化。以前的协议将利用合成非异氰酸酯聚氨酯泡沫具有特定的化学连接能够解聚后合成。室温发泡将通过催化剂优化和紫外光辅助固化工艺，通过添加丙烯酸单体和含有乙烯基的活性稀释剂来辅助。这种方法还将有助于改变反应混合物的粘度，以生产用于包装应用的低密度泡沫。该项目的成功结果可能会证明在室温下生产无毒聚氨酯的商业上可行的工艺，这种聚氨酯是专门为其使用寿命结束时降解而设计的。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并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，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Partnerships for Innovation – Technology Translation (PFI-TT) project is the conversion from a toxic to benign manufacturing sequence for polyurethane foams in the packaging, insulation, and construction markets. Polyurethanes rank the 6th most produced plastic in the world yet use cancer-causing, mutagenic and reproductive toxins in their manufacture. This project combines a 100% biobased source with non-toxic ingredients to synthesize polyurethane foams that can be recycled back to their starting materials at their end-of-life. The ideal of reducing plastic waste in the environment and eliminating the use of carcinogenic material is desired across many industries. However, the use of one-time-use plastics in packaging applications as well as foams used for insulation has placed particular environmental focus on the polyurethane industry. This project addresses the need to transition from petroleum-based sources to biobased feedstocks and enable industrially viable processes for non-toxic polyurethanes in diverse commercial platforms. The successful outcome of this project would be a complete shift for the polyurethane industry by innovating new routes to polyurethanes that embrace a circular lifecycle. This project seeks to enable a room temperature foaming and curing protocol for a biobased, non-isocyanate polyurethane. Polyurethanes are manufactured commercially from polyols and isocyanates; The isocyanate carries significant health and safety dangers as it is a cancer-causing, mutagenic and a reproductive toxin (CMR). Non-isocyanate formulations in industry are currently very limited due to the inability to adapt new non-isocyanate chemistries to processing conditions typically used in industrial and commercial applications. To create reactive biobased precursors for synthesis, reductive catalytic fractionation (RCF) will be employed to woody feedstocks to extract an oil rich in bi-functional aromatic compounds capable of functionalizing with cyclic carbonates. A previous protocol will be leveraged to synthesize non-isocyanate polyurethane foams with specific chemical linkages capable of depolymerization post-synthesis. Room temperature foaming will be aided by catalyst optimization and a ultraviolet light-assisted curing process through the addition of acrylated monomers and reactive diluents containing vinyl groups. This approach will also facilitate the ability to vary the viscosity of the reaction mixture to produce low density foams for packaging applications. The successful outcome of the project may demonstrate a commercially viable process for producing non-toxic polyurethanes at room temperature that are specifically designed for degradation at their end-of-life.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.