Degradable poly(β-amino ester) microparticles for cleansing products and food fortification
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s44286-024-00151-0.pdf
Description
Published version
Size
3.6 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
758ac8d0e80316841c92b6500be421f4
Author(s)
Zhang, Linzixuan
Xiao, Ruiqing
Jin, Tianyi
Pan, Xinyan
Fransen, Katharina A
Alsaiari, Shahad K
Lau, Alicia
He, Ruizhe
Han, Jooli
Pedretti, Benjamin J
Date Issued
2024
Journal
Nature Chemical Engineering
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Citation
Zhang, L., Xiao, R., Jin, T. et al. Degradable poly(β-amino ester) microparticles for cleansing products and food fortification. Nat Chem Eng 2, 77–89 (2025).
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Microplastic pollution is a pressing global crisis caused by the extensive use of nondegradable microplastic materials in daily activities. One effective approach to mitigate this issue is to replace nondegradable plastics with degradable materials that have properties amendable for targeted applications. Here we present the development of a degradable microparticle (MP) platform based on a poly(β-amino ester) (PAE) that degrades into sugar and amino acid derivatives. This PAE MP platform showed functional replacement of nondegradable microplastics used in cleansing products and food fortification. In cleansing products, PAE MPs effectively enhanced the cleansing efficiency of a representative rinse-off product and showed effective removal of potentially toxic elements, as an alternative of traditional nondegradable microbeads. In food fortification, PAE MPs provided robust protection for multiple essential vitamins and minerals against extensive cooking and storage conditions with rapid nutrient release in a simulated human digestion system. Collectively, these PAE MPs present a potential platform to replace microplastic usage on a global scale in many applications.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Chemical Engineering
Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Biological Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Materials Science and Engineering
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1038/s44286-024-00151-0
