Ananda S. Amarasekara^1,2,*, Gabriel Murillo Morales^1,2, Raghava R. Kommalapati^2,3

Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.12, No.9, pp. 1495-1506, 2024, DOI:10.32604/jrm.2024.052373

Abstract Renewable resources based polymers provides a sustainable alternative to petroleum derived polymeric materials. As a part of our series on synthesis of vanillin based renewable polymers, we report the synthesis of poly(hydrovanilloin-furfural) [poly(HVL-Fur)] and poly(hydrovanilloin–5-hydromethylfurfural) [poly(HVL-5-HMF)]. Vanillin was dimerized to a mixtures of meso/DL-hydrovanilloins with 94% meso product by electrochemical reductive coupling in aqueous sodium hydroxide using lead electrodes in quantitative yield. Then sodium hydroxide catalyzed condensation of hydrovanilloin with furfural in water at 80°C for 72 h was used to synthesize poly(HVL-Fur) with Mw = 8600 g mol⁻¹, PDI = 1.28 in 78% yield. Similarly, condensation of hydrovanilloin More > Graphic Abstract

Rauany Cristina Lopes¹, Tamires Nossa², Wilton Rogério Lustri¹, Gabriel Lombardo^3,4,5, Maria Inés Errea^3,4, Eliane Trovatti^1,*

Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.12, No.4, pp. 643-666, 2024, DOI:10.32604/jrm.2024.048957

Abstract Polymers from renewable resources have been used for a long time in biomedical applications and found an irreplaceable role in some of them. Their uses have been increasing because of their attractive properties, contributing to the improvement of life quality, mainly in drug release systems and in regenerative medicine. Formulations using natural polymer, nano and microscale particles preparation, composites, blends and chemical modification strategies have been used to improve their properties for clinical application. Although many studies have been carried out with these natural polymers, the way to reach the market is long and only More >

Ananda S. Amarasekara^*, Muhammad A. Hasan, Eve Larkin

Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.1, pp. 62-66, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2016.634129

Abstract Condensation polymerization of renewable resources-based monomers, 4-ketopimelic acid and glycerol, were studied using two different catalysts; p-toluenesulfonic acid and Sb2O3. The highest polymer yield of 96% was achieved by using a 3:4 mole ratio mixture of 4-ketopimelic acid and glycerol, with Sb2O3 (0.5 mol% relative to 4-ketopimelic acid) as catalyst and heating at 23–210 °C, under N2 for 1 h; then 210 °C, vacuum, 12 h. The poly(4-ketopimelic acid-glycerol) formed is insoluble in all common organic solvents and is shown to contain a branched polymeric structure with ketal and ester links by using FT-IR, 1H More >

M.C. Lagel¹, A. Pizzi^1,2, S. Giovando³, A. Celzard⁴

Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.2, No.3, pp. 220-229, 2014, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2014.634113

Abstract With the depletion of fossil resources, tannin extracts can be a natural alternative to some synthetic products. Hydrolysable chestnut tannin extracts have been used to partially replace phenol in PF resins for phenolic rigid foams. Phenol-formaldehyde-chestnut tannin (PFT) phenolic foams were initially made from copolymerized PFT resins of different molar ratio. The PFT foams so prepared were tested for thermal conductivity, these being slightly worse than that of pure PF foams; and for mechanical and water absorption, these two properties being better than those of pure PF foams. Indeed, PF resins represent an important part More >