Polymer Chemistry

Course goals

At the end of this course, you will be able:
1) to evaluate a suitable polymerization strategy for a given monomer, taking into account the desired properties and application of the produced polymer.
2) to understand and apply the quantitative relationships between polymerization conditions (mechanism and process), molar masses, molecular microstructure and properties.
3) Working in a team, apply at least one of the most important polymerization techniques in the lab, interpret and clearly report the results.
4) to understand and apply the most important characterization methods for molar mass (distributions) and chemical composition.
5) to understand the most important mechanical and thermal properties of polymers.
6) To evaluate the most important applications of polymers and polymer materials in the societal plastic waste problem.
7) to evaluate approaches to synthesizing sustainable polymers and to recycle plastics in the
societal plastic waste problem.
 

Content

The diversity of synthetic and natural polymers makes them essential for daily life. Applications range from hygiene and food packaging to drug delivery, regenerative medicine and specialized coatings. The properties of polymeric materials are a result of the interplay between their chain-like structure and the chemistry of the molecules, the monomers, that makes up this chain. Not only the choice of monomer determines the final properties of the polymer, but also the polymerization technique used and further processing. Polymer production accounts for about 40% of all chemical products and the annual production in 2019 was 268 million tons. The success of plastics has also led to an increasing challenge for plastic waste management, which will have to be addressed with better (chemical) recycling techniques, but also design for recycling.

In this course you will learn the basic tools for polymer synthesis and characterization as well as applications of polymers in various fields. 
•    Introduction to polymers
•    Step growth polymerization: linear and non-linear
•    Chain growth polymerization: (controlled/free) radical and ionic
•    Polymer solutions/mixing/separation
•    Physical properties/characterization (GPC, NMR, MALDI-TOF MS, thermal and mechanical properties)
•    Applications of polymers in drug delivery and regenerative medicine
•    Recycling of polymers and designing polymers for recycling
•    Practical work on polymer synthesis and characterization

The 5 pillars of this course are: 1) polymer synthesis; 2) polymer characterization; 3) polymer behavior; 4) applications; 5) recycling and end-of life management of polymers. These pillars will give you the tools to understand and design polymers for specific applications, taking into account the desired properties and the end-of-life management of the materials

Place in the curriculum
For Chemistry
The introduction to Polymer Chemistry course bridges knowledge acquired in molecular chemistry (organic, inorganic and catalysis), in physics (spectroscopy, thermodynamics) and material science. It fits in the ‘leerlijnen' on physical chemistry, organic chemistry, and sustainable chemistry. It will serve as a prerequisite for a subsequent topical polymer course in the new master for Sustainability and Circular Chemistry from ISCC. 

For College of Pharmaceutical Sciences (CPS)
The Introduction to Polymer Chemistry course fits in the ‘leerlijnen’ focused on Drug Chemistry and Drug Research. Pharmaceutics is one of the focus points in the CPS program, with a strong link to the development of new materials for drug delivery and regenerative medicine.

Programme
The course comprises 10 lectures + 1 guest lecture + lab experiments: 1 lab session on polymer synthesis and characterization

The course will be supplemented by a practical experiment to expose the students to real-case examples. Students will be divided into groups and each group will have the task to polymerize a specific monomer using a specific technique. The second part of the experiment will be focused on characterization of the synthesized polymer. The aim of the practical is to further learn through experiment the kinetics of polymerization reactions and the characterization methods.