Archive
Tag: Sustainable Materials
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Bark-based polyurethane foams: the hydroxyl groups are on the wrong backbone
Bark is rich in hydroxyl groups, which is exactly what a polyurethane polyol needs. The difficulty is that they sit on rigid aromatic rings, and almost every route to bark-based…
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Latex is not a raw material: it is a defence system
Latex is stored under pressure throughout the plant and released by injury itself, coagulating within minutes to seal the wound and trap insects. Reading it as defence rather than commodity…
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The pine cone: a material that opens and closes without energy
A pine cone opens when dry and closes when damp, using no cells, no energy and no moving parts. How the bilayer mechanism works, why the microfibril angle explains it,…
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Lignin: the polymer built without a blueprint
Lignin is the second most abundant biopolymer on Earth and the matrix that allows trees to stand upright. Unusually among biological macromolecules, it is assembled without a genetic template, and…
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Bio-based, biodegradable, compostable: three terms that are not interchangeable
Bio-based describes where a material comes from. Biodegradable describes what can happen to it. Compostable describes what has been verified to happen, under defined conditions. An explanation of the distinctions,…