The Indian Institute of Technology-Madras (IIT-M) announced on Friday a partnership with JK Fenner to build a more biodegradable alternative to elastomers and rubber products that are used to make various utilitarian items.
JK Fenner, a leading industrial house in India, will provide support for this research and development project as part of its Corporate Social Responsibilities (CSR) initiative.
The CSR funding will also support research to explore modification of natural fibres such as cotton, hemp, among others to substitute synthetic materials in belts.
A Memorandum of Understanding of this collaboration was signed at IIT-M campus on July 7 by Prof. Mahesh Panchagnula, IIT-M’s dean of alumni and corporate relations, and Nagaraju Srirama, president and director of JK Fenner (India) Limited.
According to the IIT-M, this research is vital because although natural rubber is biodegradable, the finished product is slow to break down—in part due to the presence of non-degradable chemical units that function as molecular bridges.
“We jointly believe that CSR invested in technology development is a sound way to ensure a more sustainable tomorrow for all of us,” Panchagnula said.
The premier institute also clarified that most synthetic rubbers, too, are not amenable to biodegradation due to their structural feature—consisting of carbon-carbon single bonds (in the backbone) that are difficult to break down. Hence, the finished rubber product—after its service life—remains without much structural degradation for a longer period.
Srirama said the research will forge a new direction in the rubber industry (belts/hoses) which will be environmentally friendly and will support our initiative towards a sustainable future.
An IIT-M research team, headed by R Dhamodharan, professor with the IIT-M’s department of chemistry, aims to tackle this issue through the research and development of effective, biodegradable, molecular bridges as an alternative.
“The structure of the polymer to address these issues should be amenable to the ‘standard curing procedure’ established in the rubber industry. The polymer as well as the ‘crosslinker’ or the ‘bridge molecule’ used in the curing should also be designed with structural features that would make it suitable for biodegradation,” Dhamodharan said.