Recent developments in plant oil based functional materials

The increasing interest of academic and industrial sectors in the use of bio-based materials mirrors the overwhelming need for replacing, as much as possible, petroleum derived chemicals, reducing the negative environmental impact derived from their usage. Vegetable oils fulfill this goal extremely well, because of their worldwide availability, large volume production at comparatively low prices and versatility of the modifications and reactions in which they can participate to produce a large variety of different monomers and polymer precursors. Further reactions of these chemicals can lead to very different types of final materials with varied applications. It is because of this remarkable versatility that many review articles have appeared during the last few years; many of them have dealt with the various routes for vegetable oil modification and options for polymer synthesis, whilst others were dedicated to the analysis of the properties of the derived materials, generally focusing on structural properties. In this review, we focus on the capabilities of vegetable oils to be modified and/or reacted to obtain materials with functional properties suitable for use in coatings, conductive or insulating materials, biomedical, shape memory, self-healing and thermoreversible materials as well as other special functional applications. (C) 2015 Society of Chemical Industry