Towards biodegradable polyolefins: strategy of anchoring minute quantities of monosaccharides and disaccharides onto functionalized polystyrene, and their effect on facilitating polymer biodegradation.

A hypothesis was developed, and successfully tested, to greatly increase the rates of biodegradation of polyolefins, by anchoring minute quantities of glucose, sucrose or lactose, onto functionalized polystyrene (polystyrene-co-maleic anhydride copolymer) and measuring their rates of biodegradation, which were found to be significantly improved.