Polymer as a material plays an important role in almost
every aspect of human life. Over the last 20 years, the production of
polymeric materials such as engineering plastics, elastomers, adhesives,
coatings, textiles, packaging, foams, devices in electronics, optics,
biotechnology and bio-engineering has doubled while all other materials
has grown only about 25 percent. Today, the annual volume production
of polymeric materials exceeds the combined production of all other
materials. Polymers are subject
of interest of various disciplines such as chemistry, physics, mathematics,
engineering, biochemistry and biology. This diversity of academic disciplines aiming
to design new macromolecules and to understand their structure-property
relations created the interdisciplinary polymer science and technology
branch, which lies at the borderlines between chemistry, physics, mathematics,
biology, and engineering sciences. Polymer Science and Technology (PST) graduate program at the Istanbul Technical University has been launched to educate the students in the field of polymer science and technology, which is highly prized in both industry and academia in Turkey. We found that almost every former student from the department of chemistry was employed in a polymer-related industry. The aim of the graduate program is to educate the students in the theory and practice of macromolecules in an interdisciplinary atmosphere. Our goal is to educate top-quality polymer scientists to fill the growing requirements in industry and in the universities by conducting qualified scientific research in our laboratories "Synthesis and Characterization of Macromolecules"
is a laboratory course offered in the PST program. This course is a "core" course of theprogram, and there
are no special prerequisites. This
laboratory book was prepared by the member of PST Program for this course. It contains 11 experiments relating to the
current topics of macromolecules. The
organization of the experiments covers the basic ideas of physical and
organic chemistry of polymers including synthesis strategies of polymers,
their molecular structure, physical properties, and experimental techniques. The experiments also reflect the topics of
ongoing research works in our laboratories; therefore, it is hoped that
this will help to our graduate students to select their research areas. The experimental procedures and the methods
of data treatment are described in great detail. In addition, each experiment starts with a short introduction to
provide our students a theoretical background.
The depth of these sections are not great but the references
supplied at the end of each section will provide further informations. We are welcome comments from those who are using
this book, either as students or instructors.
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