Plastic can be sustainable

The University of Jena is researching sustainable, intelligent plastics. Image: Jens Meyer (Universität Jena) - Jena research group receives two million euros to research intelligent, recyclable plastic materials Sustainable plastics that have the ability for self-healing, have intelligent pro­perties and can be recycled if required will be the subject of future research at Friedrich Schiller University Jena. A project in this field, coordinated by the che­mist and materials scientist Prof. Ulrich S. Schubert, is being granted two million euros in funding from the Carl Zeiss Foundation. Repairing scratches with a hair dryer. " Imagine scratched surfaces on household furniture, for example in the kitchen ," says Schu­bert, describing a possible application for these intelligent plastics. " You simply heat up the relevant surface - for example with a hair dryer - and it not only looks like new, it is new. " These vitrimers, as they are known, are intended not only to make everyday objects more durable, so that they need to be replaced less frequently, and, thus, have an important en­vironmental impact.