Scale, Order and Complexity in the Design of Novel Polymer Processes
June 18th, 2000
Paper to 16th Annual Meeting, Polymer Processing Society, Shanghai, China, 18th-23rd June 2000
S F Bush
Introduction: Market Needs and the Role of Polymer Processing
While there will always be room for serendipity in research, nonetheless ‘chance favours prepared minds’. Research opportunity will increasingly flow from a preparedness to respond to market needs. Particular goals will be achieved by the interaction of polymer science, polymer processing and product design.
The needs which the polymer industry responds to may be summarised under the following eight headings:
- The elimination or reduction of routine personal services, (e.g. easy-care textile fabrics, dirt-resistant decorative coatings and laminates)
- More efficient living space, (e.g. foamed insulation, corrosion resistant pipework)
- Fuel efficient, and more secure transportation, (e.g. weight reduction through polymeric components, elastic end sections for moving vehicles)
- Increased variety and quality of food and drink, (e.g. multilayer film packaging, lightweight bottles)
- Leisure, (e.g. lightweight, moisture repellent clothing and textiles)
- Economising on natural resource usage, (e.g. reduced energy in materials procesing, hardwood substitutions)
- Improved health-care, (e.g. contact lens, polymer prostheses, implants, drug delivery systems)
- Ever more powerful information technology, (e.g. compact disks, polymeric display systems)
Pressure is also unremitting to reduce the time between recognition of a market need and manufacture of the final product for sale. The future growth of the polymer industry will depend in part on how well it is able to respond to this imperative. It is the role of polymer processing to translate the desired features of the polymer architecture into a shaped artefact which meets a market need. Superimposed on all of these needs is the need to recycle by re-use or reprocessing.