POLYMERS THAT READILY DEGRADE IN SEAWATER TAKE INSPIRATION FROM RNA

摘要

Several million tons of plastic waste enter the oceans every year, resulting in a persistent environmental problem. That's why scientists are interested in designing polymers that have ideal qualities for plastics applications and are also biodegradable. But while the well-studied biopolymer, polylactide, does degrade faster than commodity products, its degradation rate in seawater is still very slow. In an effort to develop biopolymers that decompose rapidly to minimize marine pollution, Frederik Wurm and colleagues created a library of RNA-inspired polylactide derivatives and tested their degradability in artificial seawater (DOI: 10.1021/ jacs.1c07508). The researchers found that the polymers degrade much more quickly, thanks to the presence of phosphoester "breaking points" that accelerate chain scission by intramolecular transesterification in the presence of water. To prepare polylactide with controlled distances of breaking points along the backbone, the researchers use sequence-controlled anionic ring-opening copolymerization of lactide and a cyclic phosphate. The team found that by altering the number of phosphoester groups, they could vary the speed of degradation from 2 years to 2 weeks. The researchers say the RNA-inspired degradation pathway is a general strategy that could be applied to other synthetic polymers.