Bio-Based Polymers for Engineered Green Materials

Every. Single. Carbon atom oxides to CO2 at the end. Every. Single. One.
The more we pump petroleum-fixed carbon into the carbon cycle, the higher will be the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere. The higher the CO2, the greater will be the temperature of the planet. This increase in temperature will also raise the concentration of water in air. Water and CO2 are the molecules that contribute the most to the greenhouse effect. The planet is subject to daily warming, and the later we take account of it and act, the more difficult will the battle against global warming be.
It is time to change our views and make this problem a priority. Consumer demands need to care about the carbon neutrality of products so that the market and industry are forced to offer alternative and more sustainable solutions.
In polymer science, this message means that we are to exploit as much as possible the materials that nature synthesizes, process them in a sustainable way, and eventually modify them to give the new materials the high-performing properties we are used to. We aim to zealously maintain the carbon atoms that are fixed in solid phase.
This is what our scientific community is trying to do on a daily basis—taking important steps to produce carbon-neutral, bio-based, high-performing materials.