#polymethyl methacrylate

[materialsscienceandengineering]

Innovative film combines cooling efficiency with vibrant structural colors

In a study published in Matter, Song Yanlin's lab from the Institute of Chemistry of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and Li Mingzhu's lab from the Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry of CAS designed a structurally colored radiative cooling film with a hierarchically porous nested structure (SC-RC film), which can preserve highly efficient subambient cooling performance and provide an appealing colorful appearance. The SC-RC film was engineered to reflect sunlight across a broad range of wavelengths while exhibiting distinct reflective peaks at specific wavelengths. It resulted in brilliant structural colors without compromising cooling efficiency. The color can be adjusted by altering the diameter of colloidal nanoparticles. The innovative design embedded colloidal photonic crystals into micropits, ensuring a confined assembly of nanoparticles and reducing defects associated with self-assembly. This process resulted in vibrant structural colors. In addition, the porous polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) micropit framework provided protective support for colloidal photonic crystals that significantly enhanced the mechanical stability of the structural colors.

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[materialsscienceandengineering]

Poly(methyl methacrylate) Recycling

Poly(methyl methacrylate), PMMA, also known as acrylic, is a non-crystalline plastic often used as an alternative to glass. It is often mixed with other polymers or other monomers to improve flexibility and other properties. As such, recycling rates for PMMA are relatively low as the pure product is difficult to produce from such methods, in addition to the high energy costs required. It is estimated that only around 10% of this plastic is recycled. When it is recycled, PMMA is often mechanically or chemically recycled, with chemical recycling the more common technique.

Sources/Further Reading: (Image source - Book chapter) (2018 article) (Sustainable Plastics) (Wikipedia)

[materialsscienceandengineering]

Eggshell-based surgical material for skull injuries

A bioactive polymer-ceramic composite for fixing implants and restoring bone defects in the skull was developed by an international group of materials scientists from the NUST MISIS Center for Composite Materials. An innovative composition of the material based on eggshell-derived bioceramic provides increased strength and biointegration of implants. The results of the work were published in the international scientific journal Journal of Asian Ceramic Societies.

Polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) is a synthetic polymer used by surgeons as a 'bone cement' due to its self-curing and strength properties. But this material is bioinert by its nature, therefore it has a weak chemical and biological interactions with living tissues and hardly integrates with bones.

Scientists are actively investigating PMMA in order to 'optimize' it for wider application in various biomedical fields, for example, ensuring reliable fixation of artificial joints/implants, dental fixators, closure of cranial defects in various injuries, etc.

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[materialsscienceandengineering]

Polymers join forces to deliver

An affordable, heavy metal- and odor-free method for making hollow polymer nanostructures has been designed by A*STAR researchers. These structures could find use as delivery systems for personal care products, drugs and agrochemicals.

The use of hollow polymer nanostructures for carrying—and preserving the stability of—active ingredients, such as salicylic acid, vitamins, drugs and pesticides, is booming. These shells release cargo on demand in response to triggers such as water. Current manufacturing methods are imperfect, due to either cost, environmental or safety reasons. Significant efforts are therefore being devoted to developing alternatives.

Alexander van Herk from the A*STAR Institute of Chemical and Engineering Sciences and Atsushi Goto from Nanyang Technological University, have designed a safe, simple route to synthesize polymer nanoparticles, nanocylinders and nanocapsules.

The first stage in this two-step synthesis is to polymerize methylacrylic acid (MAA) in the presence of iodine to make alkyl iodides. The poly(methacrylic acid) (PMAA) then acts as an initiator in the polymerization of methyl methacrylate (MMA) and formation of the block co-polymer. Sodium iodide is the catalyst in both stages. PMAA is hydrophilic and poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) is hydrophobic, meaning that in polar solvents such as ethanol and water the co-polymer self-assembles into hollow nanostructures.

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[materialsscienceandengineering]

Scientists set record resolution for drawing at the one-nanometer length scale

An electron microscope-based lithography system for patterning materials at sizes as small as a single nanometer could be used to create and study materials with new properties

The ability to pattern materials at ever-smaller sizes -- using electron-beam lithography (EBL), in which an electron-sensitive material is exposed to a focused beam of electrons, as a primary method -- is driving advances in nanotechnology. When the feature size of materials is reduced from the macroscale to the nanoscale, individual atoms and molecules can be manipulated to dramatically alter material properties, such as color, chemical reactivity, electrical conductivity, and light interactions.

In the ongoing quest to pattern materials with ever-smaller feature sizes, scientists at the Center for Functional Nanomaterials (CFN) -- a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science User Facility at Brookhaven National Laboratory -- have recently set a new record. Performing EBL with a scanning transmission electron microscope (STEM), they have patterned thin films of the polymer poly(methyl methacrylate), or PMMA, with individual features as small as one nanometer (nm), and with a spacing between features of 11 nm, yielding an areal density of nearly one trillion features per square centimeter. These record achievements are published in the April 18 online edition of Nano Letters.

"Our goal at CFN is to study how the optical, electrical, thermal, and other properties of materials change as their feature sizes get smaller," said lead author Vitor Manfrinato, a research associate in CFN's electron microscopy group who began the project as a CFN user while completing his doctoral work at MIT. "Until now, patterning materials at a single nanometer has not been possible in a controllable and efficient way."

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[sameermi]

https://hallbook.com.br/blogs/724527/Bone-Cement-Market-Growth-Driven-by-Advanced-Biomaterials

[spiralingguitarist]

idiot question but what does polymethyl methacrylate taste like to anyone whos ever eaten/swallowed it. asking for a friend

[agaselectronicmaterials]

Find PMMA/Co-polymer positive resists for E-beam processing from AGAS EM. Read more about Polymethyl Methacrylate and its properties on our

PMMA (polymethyl methacrylate) is a versatile polymeric material that is well-suited for many imaging and non-imaging microelectronic applications. PMMA resists are simply PMMA polymer dissolved in a solvent like anisole (safe solvent). Exposure causes scission of the polymer chains. PMMA is most commonly used as a high resolution positive resist for direct write e-beam offering extremely high-resolution, ease of handling and excellent film characteristics. PMMA is also used as a protective coating for wafer thinning, as a bonding adhesive and as a sacrificial layer.