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Flexible packaging polymer primer

With a beginning understanding of the attributes desired for a film package, the next step is winnowing down the huge selection of possible polymers to those that offer the best combination of cost and performance for your needs.

The word β€œpolymer” derives from the Greek words poly, which means β€œmany,” and mer, which means β€œparts.” There are naturally occurring polymers; polymer cellulose is the major constituent of plant cell walls and makes up about 50% by weight of most wood and over 85% of cottonseed hair fibers.  Regenerated wood cellulose was one of the first polymer packaging films, and is still in use, with a resurgence of interest due to its natural,
renewable source.

The main action in polymer films, however, is in synthetic polymers, which are produced by connecting simple molecules by a process called polymerization. The nature of simple monomers (Greek for β€œsmall parts”) and how many and in what way they are connected lead to the properties that are unique to each different polymer type and its variants. 

A polymer made from a single monomer is called a homopolymer; a copolymer is made from mixtures of two or more different monomers, each called comonomers. Comonomers can connect in different ways: along the main chain or backbone of the polymer molecule in ordered or random ways, or as branches of one polymer off the backbone of the other. A specialized subset of copolymers that is quite useful in packaging is an ionomer.

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