Polymers™

Doctors and nurse s scramble through the emergency room calm and collective. However, it’s no secret their minds are racing as they care for, and save the lives of, patients each and every day. It’s also no secret that patients put their trust in medical professionals to diagnose and treat illnesses. You’ve probably never stopped to consider how doctors and nurses tell the difference between certain medical devices. For instance, did you know the  difference between  a 22 gauge needle and a 20 gauge needle cannot be distinguished by the naked eye? The diameter of a 22 gauge needle is .0275 inches, while a 20 gauge needle has a diameter of 0.0375. Do you know how medical professionals tell the difference between medical devices? Color-coding, of course! The first paragraph may have blown your mind a little bit, so your wheels may be turning. Have you ever  really  stopped to consider color-coding in the vast world of medical devices? As we previously stated,...

Unless you live under a rock, you’ve heard about recent plastic bag bans happening around the world. We  recently blogged about how France is giving consumers until 2020 to switch to disposable dishes made from 50 percent biodegradable material. People are constantly searching for ways to reduce waste in landfills by using more eco-friendly materials and products like reusable shopping bags. However, a new type of bag, made from cassava, a widespread and affordable vegetable across Indonesia, is on the horizon and could help the war on waste. Kevin Kumala, a biology graduate and the brains behind the innovation, got to thinking when he was in Bali and noticed motorists wearing vinyl ponchos. He realized most of these ponchos, which do not decompose, were being worn a handful of times, only to be thrown away and end up in a landfill. Bali suffers from a large amount of waste washing up on its beaches, mainly from China and Indonesia dumping plastic in the ocean. After this ...

We are always doing our best to keep up with industry news. So when we stumbled across a super cool video about a polymer product that’s meeting a practical need we knew we had to share it with our audience. The video was about a construction material called FlexiPave being utilized in Yellowstone National Park.  The video , published on the TechInsider YouTube channel, instantly grabbed our attention. Developed in 2001,  Flexi-Pave  is the flagship product of KB Industries (KBI), located in Florida. The material is a sustainable, thirsty concrete able to absorb 50 gallons of water per minute, or 3,000 gallons an hour, and doesn’t need a draining system. It is made from a combination of recycled tires and stones, which makes it an excellent use for waste material. Not only that, there is an antimicrobial agent within the final product that helps purify the water as it moves through the pores of the material by reducing the dissolved phosphates and nitrates. The end...

Did you know 78 mil lion tons of plastic are used in a single year for packaging? This includes things like to-go containers and soda bottles. Only two percent of these items truly get reused and recycled, with the majority ending up in landfills. However, there is a reason these numbers are so startling, and it may have to do with polypropylene (PP) and polyethylene (PE) – something we have discussed before on our blog. We know, we know – you’re concerned about all of this, but please — don’t fear! Geoffrey Coates, Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Tisch University, and his team have discovered a solution that may combat the problem. So, what do PP and PE have to do with this situation? According to  Azo Materials  they account for two-thirds of all plastics in the world, but the problem is they have different chemical structures, and currently cannot be repurposed together. That is until an efficient technology to meld the two into one comes a...

Every day on my way to  work you can bet that once the kids are dropped off at school the Disney soundtrack is off and K92 is on. This local morning show is hilarious and starts my day off with a lot of laughs. One of the personalities, Zack, is particularly hilarious. His sarcasm is thick, so much so that he has created an entire segment called, “Zack’s Anger Diary.” In  this bit  he “is the voice of those annoying and incorrect things” that surround us each and every day. Wouldn’t you know, I recently heard one in which he  ranted about plastic ? It’s true. Zack’s bottom line is this, “The entire world is run by tiny pieces of plastic.” He finds this problematic because he blames the product failures he experiences on these pieces of plastic. His examples included portions of his car door handle and even his vacuum cleaner. I get it, it’s not fun to have your everyday items fall apart but I think plastic got over abused in this bit. In this bit, there w...

During the week, my evenings look a little like this: I leave the office around 5:00 PM, arrive home between 5:30 and 5:35 PM, my fiancé and I sit down to eat dinner, and by 6:30 PM we are on the couch tuning in to our favorite newscast,  NBC Nightly News , with Lester Holt. I believe staying up-to-date on what is happening around the world is one of the most important things we, as humans, can do. So, when I saw a story about breakthrough research for arthritis sufferers I turned the volume up a few notches and what I heard was music to my ears. But why should I care about arthritis? After all I’m 22 years old and arthritis is for “old” people, right? Stop right there – you’re wrong. My sister, Cymric, is a perfectly healthy 25 year old and suffers from arthritis. She has already had surgery on her big toe to alleviate pain; and will one day have to have surgery on her other toe and, possibly, her thumbs. So, this story hit home in more way than one. Luckily, I work in a ma...

Have you ever notice d when you are unloading your dishwasher some dishes, specifically plastic, are covered in beads of water? This may lead to you questioning how clean your dishes really are, or if something is wrong with your dishwasher. This problem is actually quite common when it comes to washing plastic in the dishwasher (which you should ensure your plastic dishware is dishwasher safe – a topic for a future blog.) Luckily, this problem can be explained by science, of course – because why else would we be discussing it? Conductivity On average, a dishwasher will reach temperatures anywhere from 130 and 170 degrees Fahrenheit. Metal, glass, and plastic products all absorb heat at different rates, which impacts how quickly they can dry.  Generally speaking, plastics are light weight materials, meaning they’re lighter and thinner than other options, and absorb less heat, making it difficult for water to evaporate. Another issue that can arise from lightweight plasti...