Abstract
Polymers become more important in everyday life. Although extremely useful in their life cycle, polymers become long-term pollutants. Worldwide, along the increased research in the environmental field, one can obviously observe a keen interest into new biodegradable and biocompatible plastic materials. This paper presents the synthesis and characterization of a new class of biodegradable copolymers based on carbohydrates. An oligomer was synthesized by the polycondensation of 3-benzyl-5,6-(bis(maleyloxy))-1,2-isopropylideneglucofuranose with propane-1,3-diol in the presence of p-toluenesulfonic acid and then it was copolymerized with hydroxypropyl (meth)acrylate, using benzoyl peroxide as initiator. The oligomer was characterized by FTIR, NMR spectroscopy and HPLC-MS, and the copolymers were analyzed using FTIR and thermogravimetry. Keywords: glucose, glycopolymer, maleic anhydride