New Perspectives in Science Education

Many objects in our everyday life are made of polymers. From drinking bottles to contact lenses, the development of materials with tailor-made properties remains an important topic of current research in chemistry and material science. While the variation of monomers, reaction parameters and additives make it possible to produce polymers with a wide range of properties, the application of nanomaterials as additives in synthesis offers outstanding potential in this context. The resulting nanocomposite materials show special properties depending on the additive. On this basis, fracture-resistant lightweight bodies [1] or antimicrobial surfaces for medical purposes are currently being developed [2]. This combination of "classical" polymer chemistry with nanotechnology offers attractive new ideas for school chemistry education. Through didactic reconstruction, this current field of research can be easily integrated into K12 chemistry curricula in a vivid way with many student experiments. The examples presented in this contribution include a simple synthesis strategy using conventional laboratory equipment, tea light shells and unsaturated polyester resin from a hardware store. Examples of nanoadditives are aluminum oxide, which increases breaking strength, and silver, which enables an antimicrobial effect. The properties can then be investigated (e.g. based on industrial materials testing) in descriptive model experiments [3]. Overall, it should be shown that the synergistic networking of polymer chemistry and nanotechnology results in a variety of learning opportunities and questions with curricular relevance for the upper secondary school.

Keywords: Nanosciences, polymer, model experiments, smart materials, chemistry education.

References:
[1] A. Kockmann, J. C. Porsiel, R. Saadat, G. Garnweitner, RSC Adv. 2018, 8 (20), 11109-11118.
[2] M. Abbas, N. Naeem, H. Iftikhar, U. Latif, Silver nanoparticles. Fabrication, characterization and applications 2018, 4, 71-91.
[3] R. Saadat, B. Bartram, T. Wilke, W. J. Chem. Ed., 2019, 7 (2), 65-71.