Ms Maham Hayat

I am a PhD Research Student in Chemistry at The Open University with an academic background in Chemistry and several years of industrial experience. My current research project is focused on reversible polymerisation for recycling of plastics and coatings. My current research project is in collaboration with WJ Products and focusses on developing recyclable road markings. 

Reversible polymerization for the recovery of plastics and coatings

While there has been considerable effort in developing processes and materials to make plastics recyclable and reusable, some plastics and polymeric materials remain difficult to recycle and typically end up in landfill. These materials are usually based on hard polystyrenes, epoxy resins and acrylates which are attractive to industries which require hard-wearing products, such as road marking and coatings. Furthermore, many of the current methods to make plastics recyclable or decomposable diminish their mechanical properties such as hardness and durability required for surface coatings. We have been piloting some approaches for polystyrene road studs to address this issue. These are temporary studs glued to the road to provide lane guidance during roadworks. They are currently deposited in landfill after a single use. The pilot approach used a range of surfactants and varying critical micelle concentrations to determine the optimum conditions (composition of surfactant, temperature, and time) to remove the adhesive that bonds the studs to the road. The recovered polystyrene studs will be ground and remolded and their mechanical and physical properties (e.g. hardness, hydrophobicity, glass and melting temperatures) examined and compared with newly manufactured studs. A second approach uses reversible polymerization to depolymerise the materials. This approach focuses on synthetic polymer chemistry and builds on pilot work we have done in preparing polymers with chemically cleavable bonds. This allows a polymer to be decomposed or decured and potentially makes it easier to remove and recover from the environment. Acrylates are increasingly being used as alternatives to thermoplastics in the road marking industry and this work will use light induced processes such as Photoinduced Electron Transfer (PET) to control the polymerisation of acrylates. 

Prior to joining The Open Universiy, I worked extensively in the manufacturing sector with FMCGs like Coca Cola Icecek and Nestle Pakistan, gaining hands on laboratory experience.