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Replacing petroleum-based materials
DuPont (the same company for which Carothers worked) has recently
developed a process by which some of the raw materials for its polymers
can be grown from renewable resources rather than petroleum-based products.
They have opened a new plant for making one of the raw materials for
synthetic fabrics, using bacterial fermentation to make 1,3-propanediol
(which is an intermediate for manufacturing polypropylene terephthalate,
used as a fabric). The raw material in this case is glucose
(from corn sugar). Details can be found on the
DuPont website.
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