Addition polymers from natural oils - A review

Emerging technological knowledge is leading research into new ventures. One such is the conversion of natural oils to polymers to augment the use of petroleum products as the source of polymeric raw materials. Natural oils, such as vegetable oils, now mainly used in the food industry, offer alternatives, and recent research has studied new routes of synthesis of polymers from natural oils. This review paper discusses the synthesis and characterization of new polymers from different natural oils such as soybean, corn, tung, linseed, castor, and fish oil. The effects of different levels of unsaturation in the natural oils and various types of catalysts and comonomers on the properties of copolymers are considered. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.