Instruct: Given a question, retrieve relevant documents that can help answer the question.
Query: What was the first synthetic polymer?
Some familiar household synthetic polymers include: Nylons in textiles and fabrics, Teflon in non-stick pans, Bakelite for electrical switches, polyvinyl chloride (PVC) in pipes, etc. The common PET bottles are made of a synthetic polymer, polyethylene terephthalate. The plastic kits and covers are mostly made of synthetic polymers like polythene and tires are manufactured from Buna rubbers. However, due to the environmental issues created by these synthetic polymers which are mostly non-biodegradable and often synthesized from petroleum, alternatives like bioplastics are also being considered. They are however expensive when compared to the synthetic polymers.The eight most common types of synthetic organic polymers, which are commonly found in households are:
In 1912, the first patents for polyvinyl chloride (PVC) were founded in Britain and Germany. It was not until the early 1930s that PVC was able to be produced cheaply, limiting its marketable applications for the time. World War II helped make the substance popular, as manufacturers used it to make an assortment of items for soldiers. It was here that PVC’s water resistance was shown to be an important property, and tools made from PVC were used in many marine applications. After the war, PVC was not a popular choice of materials in the marine industry due to its density. In the 1970s, the need for a strong, moisture-resistant material led to plastic manufactures working with PVC to make it lighter. This led to the creation of PVC foamboard, by combining PVC with polyurea at the molecular level.
DNA, RNA and proteins are most common sequence-controlled polymers in living creatures. Inspired by them, polymerization methods, utilizing DNA or RNA as templates to control sequences of polymer, are developed. At first, taking DNA or RNA as templates, scientists developed a series of peptide nucleic acid (PNA)-based polymers, without using DNA polymerases. But this method is limited to polymerization scale and yield. After that, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is developed, which currently is still the most extensively used sequence-regulated method. By employing enzymes, the yields and scales are greatly increased, but the specificity of enzymes towards natural peptides limits this technique to a certain degree. Nowadays, more attention is paid to utilization of ribosomes to directly mimic the transcription and translation process. This technology called protein engineering is considered as the most promising biological polymerization method for synthesis of sequence-controlled polymers.
The Dupont Viscoloid Company, Inc. is a former plastics manufacturer based in Leominster, Massachusetts. The company was founded by Alexander Paton, Ludwig Stross and Bernard W. Doyle in 1901 as the Sterling Comb Company. In 1912, the three men consolidated a number of smaller plastics manufactures under the name Viscoloid Company. The company pioneered the use of pyroxylin plastic in hair combs, toilet articles, and a number of different products. In 1914, the Viscoloid Company began marketing pyroxylin plastic toys. The toy industry quickly became the company’s most profitable, and the Viscoloid was soon the leading pyroxylin plastic toy manufacturer in America. By 1923, Bernard Doyle had taken over the company and “The Viscoloid” spanned 106 buildings and was the largest employer in Leominster. In 1925, the company was sold to the Dupont Company of Leominster and was renamed the Dupont Viscoloid Company, Inc. The company would continually be a giant in the plastics industry until closing in November 1977.
The first synthetic surface used for thoroughbred racing was Tropical Park's Tartan turf, a synthetic surface similar to Astroturf installed in 1966. Tartan turf was never a success with horsemen.
In 1982, High Density Plastics launched the first full-size synthetic skating floor under the trade name of Hi Den Ice. The surface was made of interlocking panels of high-density polyethylene which became an ice rink when sprayed with a gliding fluid. The surface needed to be cleaned off and resprayed once a month. In a dry form, the panels were also usable for other indoor sports.
The first genetically modified crop plant was produced in 1982, an antibiotic-resistant tobacco plant. The first field trials of genetically engineered plants occurred in France and the USA in 1986, tobacco plants were engineered to be resistant to herbicides. In 1987 Plant Genetic Systems, founded by Marc Van Montagu and Jeff Schell, was the first company to genetically engineer insect-resistant plants by incorporating genes that produced insecticidal proteins from Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) into tobacco.
The first rubber balloons were made by Professor Michael Faraday in 1824 for use in his experiments with hydrogen at the Royal Institution in London. "The caoutchouc is exceedingly elastic", he wrote in the Quarterly Journal of Science the same year. "Bags made of it...have been expanded by having air forced into them, until the caoutchouc was quite transparent, and when expanded by hydrogen they were so light as to form balloons with considerable ascending power..." Faraday made his balloons by cutting round two sheets of rubber laid together and pressing the edges together. The tacky rubber welded automatically, and the inside of the balloon was rubbed with flour to prevent the opposing surfaces joining together.
Latex rubber toy balloons were introduced by pioneer rubber manufacturer Thomas Hancock the following year in the form of a do-it-yourself kit consisting of a bottle of rubber solution and a condensing syringe. Vulcanized toy balloons, which unlike the earlier kind were unaffected by changes in temperature, were first manufactured by J.G. Ingram of London in 1847 and can be regarded as the prototype of modern toy balloons.
Developed with John Akerman of the University of Minnesota and piloted by Jean Piccard in 1937 in Rochester, Minnesota, the first multi-celled balloon was called "The Pleiades" and was made of 98 latex rubber balloons. In a letter to Robert Gray of the Dewey and Almy Chemical Co. later published in "Time" magazine, Piccard describes how he broke balloons with a hunting knife and revolver to control his descent. A TNT charge released the cluster as he expected but sent burning excelsior down that destroyed the first "Pleiades". He suggested to Gray that rock wool in place of excelsior would prevent similar accidents in the future.
In 1958, Beecham scientists in the UK discovered the penicillin nucleus, 6-APA. From that starting material, a large number of new semisynthetic penicillins could be designed, whose activity was directed against problem infections.
Artificial gene synthesis, sometimes known as DNA printing is a method in synthetic biology that is used to create artificial genes in the laboratory. Based on solid-phase DNA synthesis, it differs from molecular cloning and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) in that it does not have to begin with preexisting DNA sequences. Therefore, it is possible to make a completely synthetic double-stranded DNA molecule with no apparent limits on either nucleotide sequence or size
In August 1961, at the International Congress of Biochemistry in Moscow, Nirenberg presented his paper. The experimentation with synthetic RNA in a cell-free system was a key technical innovation. In 1961, when they announced their methods for decoding the relationship of mRNA to amino acids, there was still a lot of experimentation required before the entire code was deciphered. The scientists had to determine which bases made up each codon, then determine the sequence of bases in the codons. This proved to be a tremendous amount of work.
In the 1960s, groups led by R. Letsinger and C. Reese developed a phosphotriester approach. The defining difference from the phosphodiester approach was the protection of the phosphate moiety in the building block 1 (Scheme 4) and in the product 3 with 2-cyanoethyl group. This precluded the formation of oligonucleotides branched at the internucleosidic phosphate. The higher selectivity of the method allowed the use of more efficient coupling agents and catalysts, which dramatically reduced the length of the synthesis. The method, initially developed for the solution-phase synthesis, was also implemented on low-cross-linked "popcorn" polystyrene, and later on controlled pore glass (CPG, see "Solid support material" below), which initiated a massive research effort in solid-phase synthesis of oligonucleotides and eventually led to the automation of the oligonucleotide chain assembly.
PVC or polyvinyl chloride production dates back to the 19th century but began being widely used in the 1950s when companies discovered its versatility. By the 1980s, 20 companies were producing PVC. The advancements in chemical makeup made the material ideal for construction. Its low cost, durability, and processability made it a widely used product outside of construction into markets like IT, healthcare, and transportation The market for PVC extended out of construction into beauty products like aerosol hairspray. PVC was largely deemed harmless until four workers died of angiosarcoma in a PVC production factory in Louisville, Kentucky. After this, the vinyl industry developed a standard of one part per million (1ppm) as the acceptable level during the production of PVC and also removed PVC from hairspray products (award of commendation article). The Vinyl Institute claimed that only resin workers were at risk during the production and that the new (1ppm) standard protected against that.
In the early 1950s, Alexander Todd’s group pioneered H-phosphonate and phosphate triester methods of oligonucleotide synthesis. The reaction of compounds 1 and 2 to form H-phosphonate diester 3 is an H-phosphonate coupling in solution while that of compounds 4 and 5 to give 6 is a phosphotriester coupling (see phosphotriester synthesis below).
On July 31, 1790 inventor Samuel Hopkins of Pittsford, Vermont became the first person to be issued a patent in the United States. His patented invention was an improvement in the "making of Pot Ash by a new apparatus & process." These earliest patent law required that a working model of each invention be produced in miniature.
On December 29, 2011, chemists at Harvard University reported the creation of an artificial cell membrane.
On July 31, 1790 inventor Samuel Hopkins of Pittsford, Vermont became the first person to be issued a patent in the United States. His patented invention was an improvement in the "making of Pot Ash by a new apparatus & process." The earliest patent law required that a working model of each invention be produced in miniature.
Alexander Fleming had first discovered penicillin by accident in 1928, but at that time believed it had little application. When Florey and his team recognised the potential of the discovery for combating bacterial infection, they faced the problem of how to manufacture penicillin in sufficient quantities to be of use. Heatley, although the junior member of the team, possessed a natural gift for ingenuity and invention. It was he who suggested transferring the active ingredient of penicillin back into water by changing its acidity, thus purifying the penicillin.
The term "biochemistry" itself is derived from a combination of biology and chemistry. In 1877, Felix Hoppe-Seyler used the term ("biochemie" in German) as a synonym for physiological chemistry in the foreword to the first issue of "Zeitschrift für Physiologische Chemie" (Journal of Physiological Chemistry) where he argued for the setting up of institutes dedicated to this field of study. The German chemist Carl Neuberg however is often cited to have coined the word in 1903, while some credited it to Franz Hofmeister.
It was once generally believed that life and its materials had some essential property or substance (often referred to as the "vital principle") distinct from any found in non-living matter, and it was thought that only living beings could produce the molecules of life. Then, in 1828, Friedrich Wöhler published a paper on the synthesis of urea, proving that organic compounds can be created artificially. Since then, biochemistry has advanced, especially since the mid-20th century, with the development of new techniques such as chromatography, X-ray diffraction, dual polarisation interferometry, NMR spectroscopy, radioisotopic labeling, electron microscopy, and molecular dynamics simulations. These techniques allowed for the discovery and detailed analysis of many molecules and metabolic pathways of the cell, such as glycolysis and the Krebs cycle (citric acid cycle), and led to an understanding of biochemistry on a molecular level. Philip Randle is well-known for his discovery in diabetes research is possibly the glucose-fatty acid cycle in 1963.He confirmed that fatty acids reduce oxidation of sugar by the muscle. High fat oxidation was responsible for the insulin resistance.
Synthetic polymers are the structural materials manifested in plastics, synthetic fibers, paints, building materials, furniture, mechanical parts, and adhesives. Synthetic polymers may be divided into thermoplastic polymers and thermoset plastics. Thermoplastic polymers include polyethylene, teflon, polystyrene, polypropylene, polyester, polyurethane, Poly(methyl methacrylate), polyvinyl chloride, nylons, and rayon. Thermoset plastics include vulcanized rubber, bakelite, Kevlar, and polyepoxide. Almost all synthetic polymers are derived from petrochemicals.
The Cohen brothers were looking for a commercial edge and became aware, in 1894, that Charles Cross, Edward Bevan and Clayton Beadle had patented their "artificial silk" which they named "Viscose" in the UK and "Rayon" in the US, and sold under the trade name "Dacron". Although natural polymers have been with around since time began, synthetic polymers are more recent and owe their origin to Alexander Parkes and his exhibits at the International Exhibition in London in 1862. The most basic building block of a polymer is a monomer, which, when combined with oxygen, nitrogen, chlorine, or fluoride, becomes a "polymers". The most important polymer, for fabric construction is Polyethylene terephthalate, more commonly known as "polyester". The bright vibrant synthetic fabrics made from these synthetic "building blocks" exhibit a silk "handle"; and all the comfort properties of natural fibres, imitating silk, wool and linen.
First Kovac team looked into the acetylene family of chemicals. This resulted in more than 20 papers and patents. By 1931, DuPont was manufacturing a synthetic rubber that this team created: neoprene. Due to political and trade troubles with Japan, the United States' main source of silk, that fiber was getting harder and more expensive to come by. DuPont wanted to develop a synthetic fiber that could replace it. Kovac and his team tackled this, too. In 1934 they pulled their first long, strong, flexible strands of a synthetic polymer fiber out of a test tube (pbs kovac). The corporation patented it as "nylon" the following year. In the course of this discovery, Kovac published 31 papers, establishing general theories about polymers and regularizing the terminology of the field. He had brought the world not just nylon, but knowledge of natural polymers and how they are formed.
A thermoset polymer matrix is a synthetic polymer reinforcement first developed for structural applications, such as glass-reinforced plastic radar domes on aircraft and graphite-epoxy payload bay doors on the space shuttle. In polymer matrix composites, polymers act as binder or matrix to secure in place incorporated particulates, fibres or other reinforcements.