Decoupling polymers from fossil resources

Professor Matthew Davidson is the director of the Institute of Sustainability and Climate Change of the University of Bath. He visited us today and discussed some of the challenges in making the chemical industry more sustainable and less dependent on fossil resources.   Whereas decarbonisation of the energy sector is feasible through the development of

Dabwan’s work on encapsulation of vitamin E

Encapsulation is used to deliver materials to specific sites, protect fragile materials from harsh external environments or to delay release of an active compound until a desired time. Mohammed Al Sharabi and professor Alex Routh have been working on an EPSRC-funded project looking at making novel encapsulated materials. The project was joint with the Universities

Cracking in drying films

Professor Alex Routh has long been interested in colloidal suspensions, and today he told us about some of his recent work in the field.  When a pool of fluid containing a suspension of particles  is left to dry, the liquid slowly evaporates and the particles consolidate into a solid, which eventually cracks. We can see

The Gloves Are On!

Professor Alex Routh gave a fascinating seminar this week on the production process of rubber gloves. It’s a subject that not many of us think about, but the scale and significance of rubber glove manufacture is enormous. 300 billion latex gloves are produced globally every year, and the process is far from environmentally friendly or