Congratulations to Pan on his new paper in Green Chemistry! In this paper, we use molecular-scale modeling techniques to generate a database of solubilities for common plastic resins in a wide range of organic solvents. With our experimental collaborators in the Hube group, we then validate simulation predictions and leverage the database to rapidly design selective dissolution processes for recovering pure resins from physical mixtures representative of typical plastic waste. This tool is being used to select solvents for our Solvent-Targeted Recovery and Precipitation (STRAP) process, which is one of the primary recycling technologies being developed by the Center for the Chemical Upcycling of Waste Plastics (CUWP) at UW-Madison.
In other exciting news, the CUWP annual meeting was held at UW on May 16 and Ugo received the top poster prize for his poster entitled “Identification of Greener Solvers for Plastic Upcycling via Solvent Targeted Recovery and Precipitation.” Great work, Ugo!
