scholarly journals Biomass-Derived Production of Itaconic Acid as a Building Block in Specialty Polymers

Polymers ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 1035 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bernadette-Emőke Teleky ◽  
Dan Vodnar

Biomass, the only source of renewable organic carbon on Earth, offers an efficient substrate for bio-based organic acid production as an alternative to the leading petrochemical industry based on non-renewable resources. Itaconic acid (IA) is one of the most important organic acids that can be obtained from lignocellulose biomass. IA, a 5-C dicarboxylic acid, is a promising platform chemical with extensive applications; therefore, it is included in the top 12 building block chemicals by the US Department of Energy. Biotechnologically, IA production can take place through fermentation with fungi like Aspergillus terreus and Ustilago maydis strains or with metabolically engineered bacteria like Escherichia coli and Corynebacterium glutamicum. Bio-based IA represents a feasible substitute for petrochemically produced acrylic acid, paints, varnishes, biodegradable polymers, and other different organic compounds. IA and its derivatives, due to their trifunctional structure, support the synthesis of a wide range of innovative polymers through crosslinking, with applications in special hydrogels for water decontamination, targeted drug delivery (especially in cancer treatment), smart nanohydrogels in food applications, coatings, and elastomers. The present review summarizes the latest research regarding major IA production pathways, metabolic engineering procedures, and the synthesis and applications of novel polymeric materials.

BioResources ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 4364-4383 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrea Komesu ◽  
Johnatt Allan Rocha de Oliveira ◽  
Luiza Helena da Silva Martins ◽  
Maria Regina Wolf Maciel ◽  
Rubens Maciel Filho

Lactic acid is a naturally occurring organic acid that can be used in a wide variety of industries, such as the cosmetic, pharmaceutical, chemical, food, and, most recently, the medical industries. It can be made by the fermentation of sugars obtained from renewable resources, which means that it is an eco-friendly product that has attracted a lot of attention in recent years. In 2010, the U.S. Department of Energy issued a report that listed lactic acid as a potential building block for the future. Bearing the importance of lactic acid in mind, this review summarizes information about lactic acid properties and applications, as well as its production and purification processes.


Polymers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (20) ◽  
pp. 3574
Author(s):  
Bernadette-Emőke Teleky ◽  
Dan Cristian Vodnar

Intense research has been conducted to produce environmentally friendly biopolymers obtained from renewable feedstock to substitute fossil-based materials. This is an essential aspect for implementing the circular bioeconomy strategy, expressly declared by the European Commission in 2018 in terms of “repair, reuse, and recycling”. Competent carbon-neutral alternatives are renewable biomass waste for chemical element production, with proficient recyclability properties. Itaconic acid (IA) is a valuable platform chemical integrated into the first 12 building block compounds the achievement of which is feasible from renewable biomass or bio-wastes (agricultural, food by-products, or municipal organic waste) in conformity with the US Department of Energy. IA is primarily obtained through fermentation with Aspergillus terreus, but nowadays several microorganisms are genetically engineered to produce this organic acid in high quantities and on different substrates. Given its trifunctional structure, IA allows the synthesis of various novel biopolymers, such as drug carriers, intelligent food packaging, antimicrobial biopolymers, hydrogels in water treatment and analysis, and superabsorbent polymers binding agents. In addition, IA shows antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, and antitumor activity. Moreover, this biopolymer retains qualities like environmental effectiveness, biocompatibility, and sustainability. This manuscript aims to address the production of IA from renewable sources to create a sustainable circular economy in the future. Moreover, being an essential monomer in polymer synthesis it possesses a continuous provocation in the biopolymer chemistry domain and technologies, as defined in the present review.


2020 ◽  
Vol 17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohsen A.-M. Gomaa ◽  
Huda A. Ali

Background : The reactivity of 4-(dicyanomethylene)-3-methyl-l-phenyl-2-pyrazoline-5-one DCNP 1 and its derivatives makes it valuable as a building block for the synthesis of heterocyclic compounds like pyrazolo-imidazoles, - thiazoles, spiropyridines, spiropyrroles, spiropyrans and others. As a number of publications have reported on the reactivity of DCNP and its derivatives, we compiled some features of this interesting molecule. Objective: This article aims to review the preparation of DCNP, its reactivity and application in heterocyclic and dyes synthesis. Conclusion: In this review we have provided an overview of recent progress in the chemistry of DCNP and its significance in synthesis of various classes of heterocyclic compounds and dyes. The unique reactivity of DCNP offers unprecedentedly mild reaction conditions for the generation of versatile cynomethylene dyes from a wide range of precursors including amines, α-aminocarboxylic acids, their esters, phenols, malononitriles and azacrown ethers. We anticipate that more innovative transformations involving DCNP will continue to emerge in the near future.


Author(s):  
Simeon J. Yates ◽  
Jordana Blejmar

Two workshops were part of the final steps in the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) commissioned Ways of Being in a Digital Age project that is the basis for this Handbook. The ESRC project team coordinated one with the UK Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (ESRC-DSTL) Workshop, “The automation of future roles”; and one with the US National Science Foundation (ESRC-NSF) Workshop, “Changing work, changing lives in the new technological world.” Both workshops sought to explore the key future social science research questions arising for ever greater levels of automation, use of artificial intelligence, and the augmentation of human activity. Participants represented a wide range of disciplinary, professional, government, and nonprofit expertise. This chapter summarizes the separate and then integrated results. First, it summarizes the central social and economic context, the method and project context, and some basic definitional issues. It then identifies 11 priority areas needing further research work that emerged from the intense interactions, discussions, debates, clustering analyses, and integration activities during and after the two workshops. Throughout, it summarizes how subcategories of issues within each cluster relate to central issues (e.g., from users to global to methods) and levels of impacts (from wider social to community and organizational to individual experiences and understandings). Subsections briefly describe each of these 11 areas and their cross-cutting issues and levels. Finally, it provides a detailed Appendix of all the areas, subareas, and their specific questions.


Author(s):  
Pete Dale

Numerous claims have been made by a wide range of commentators that punk is somehow “a folk music” of some kind. Doubtless there are several continuities. Indeed, both tend to encourage amateur music-making, both often have affiliations with the Left, and both emerge at least partly from a collective/anti-competitive approach to music-making. However, there are also significant tensions between punk and folk as ideas/ideals and as applied in practice. Most obviously, punk makes claims to a “year zero” creativity (despite inevitably offering re-presentation of at least some existing elements in every instance), whereas folk music is supposed to carry forward a tradition (which, thankfully, is more recognized in recent decades as a subject-to-change “living tradition” than was the case in folk’s more purist periods). Politically, meanwhile, postwar folk has tended more toward a socialist and/or Marxist orientation, both in the US and UK, whereas punk has at least rhetorically claimed to be in favor of “anarchy” (in the UK, in particular). Collective creativity and competitive tendencies also differ between the two (perceived) genre areas. Although the folk scene’s “floor singer” tradition offers a dispersal of expressive opportunity comparable in some ways to the “anyone can do it” idea that gets associated with punk, the creative expectation of the individual within the group differs between the two. Punk has some similarities to folk, then, but there are tensions, too, and these are well worth examining if one is serious about testing out the common claim, in both folk and punk, that “anyone can do it.”


Materials ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 281
Author(s):  
Tomasz Jarosz ◽  
Przemyslaw Ledwon

Polypyrrole is a classical, well-known conjugated polymer that is produced from a simple heterocyclic system. Numerous pyrrole derivatives exhibit biological activity, and the repeat unit is a common building block present in the chemical structure of many polymeric materials, finding wide application, primarily in optoelectronics and sensing. In this work, we focus on the variety of copolymers and their material properties that can be produced electrochemically, even though all these systems are obtained from mixtures of the “simple” pyrrole monomer and its derivatives with different conjugated and non-conjugated species.


Author(s):  
Joanna Balcerek ◽  
Evelin Trejo ◽  
Kendall Levine ◽  
Paul Couey ◽  
Zoe V Kornberg ◽  
...  

Abstract Objectives Serologic testing for antibodies to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in potential donors of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) convalescent plasma (CCP) may not be performed until after blood donation. A hospital-based recruitment program for CCP may be an efficient way to identify potential donors prospectively Methods Patients who recovered from known or suspected COVID-19 were identified and recruited through medical record searches and public appeals in March and April 2020. Participants were screened with a modified donor history questionnaire and, if eligible, were asked for consent and tested for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies (IgG and IgM). Participants positive for SARS-CoV-2 IgG were referred for CCP collection. Results Of 179 patients screened, 128 completed serologic testing and 89 were referred for CCP donation. IgG antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 were detected in 23 of 51 participants with suspected COVID-19 and 66 of 77 participants with self-reported COVID-19 confirmed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR). The anti–SARS-CoV-2 IgG level met the US Food and Drug Administration criteria for “high-titer” CCP in 39% of participants confirmed by PCR, as measured by the Ortho VITROS IgG assay. A wide range of SARS-CoV-2 IgG levels were observed. Conclusions A hospital-based CCP donor recruitment program can prospectively identify potential CCP donors. Variability in SARS-CoV-2 IgG levels has implications for the selection of CCP units for transfusion.


Author(s):  
Gesa Busch ◽  
Erin Ryan ◽  
Marina A. G. von Keyserlingk ◽  
Daniel M. Weary

AbstractPublic opinion can affect the adoption of genome editing technologies. In food production, genome editing can be applied to a wide range of applications, in different species and with different purposes. This study analyzed how the public responds to five different applications of genome editing, varying the species involved and the proposed purpose of the modification. Three of the applications described the introduction of disease resistance within different species (human, plant, animal), and two targeted product quality and quantity in cattle. Online surveys in Canada, the US, Austria, Germany and Italy were carried out with a total sample size of 3698 participants. Using a between-subject design, participants were confronted with one of the five applications and asked to decide whether they considered it right or wrong. Perceived risks, benefits, and the perception of the technology as tampering with nature were surveyed and were complemented with socio-demographics and a measure of the participants’ moral foundations. In all countries, participants evaluated the application of disease resistance in humans as most right to do, followed by disease resistance in plants, and then in animals, and considered changes in product quality and quantity in cattle as least right to do. However, US and Italian participants were generally more positive toward all scenarios, and German and Austrian participants more negative. Cluster analyses identified four groups of participants: ‘strong supporters’ who saw only benefits and little risks, ‘slight supporters’ who perceived risks and valued benefits, ‘neutrals’ who showed no pronounced opinion, and ‘opponents’ who perceived higher risks and lower benefits. This research contributes to understanding public response to applications of genome editing, revealing differences that can help guide decisions related to adoption of these technologies.


Materials ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (13) ◽  
pp. 3497
Author(s):  
Piotr Stachak ◽  
Izabela Łukaszewska ◽  
Edyta Hebda ◽  
Krzysztof Pielichowski

Polyurethanes (PUs) are a significant group of polymeric materials that, due to their outstanding mechanical, chemical, and physical properties, are used in a wide range of applications. Conventionally, PUs are obtained in polyaddition reactions between diisocyanates and polyols. Due to the toxicity of isocyanate raw materials and their synthesis method utilizing phosgene, new cleaner synthetic routes for polyurethanes without using isocyanates have attracted increasing attention in recent years. Among different attempts to replace the conventional process, polyaddition of cyclic carbonates (CCs) and polyfunctional amines seems to be the most promising way to obtain non-isocyanate polyurethanes (NIPUs) or, more precisely, polyhydroxyurethanes (PHUs), while primary and secondary –OH groups are being formed alongside urethane linkages. Such an approach eliminates hazardous chemical compounds from the synthesis and leads to the fabrication of polymeric materials with unique and tunable properties. The main advantages include better chemical, mechanical, and thermal resistance, and the process itself is invulnerable to moisture, which is an essential technological feature. NIPUs can be modified via copolymerization or used as matrices to fabricate polymer composites with different additives, similar to their conventional counterparts. Hence, non-isocyanate polyurethanes are a new class of environmentally friendly polymeric materials. Many papers on the matter above have been published, including both original research and extensive reviews. However, they do not provide collected information on NIPU composites fabrication and processing. Hence, this review describes the latest progress in non-isocyanate polyurethane synthesis, modification, and finally processing. While focusing primarily on the carbonate/amine route, methods of obtaining NIPU are described, and their properties are presented. Ways of incorporating various compounds into NIPU matrices are characterized by the role of PHU materials in copolymeric materials or as an additive. Finally, diverse processing methods of non-isocyanate polyurethanes are presented, including electrospinning or 3D printing.


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