It’s hard to imagine life on Earth without polymers. Nature’s most fascinating molecules, like proteins and DNA, consist of polymers. (See this TED-ED video on polymers, “From DNA to Silly Putty.” Proteins are polymers made with repeating units of molecules called amino acids. Each protein carries out specific functions within a cell, such as DNA polymerase—a protein that builds DNA polymers one base at a time. Today, researchers design new proteins based on nature. They hope to create polymers that aid humanity as new cancer drugs, antibiotics, and even alternatives to spider silk (Max G. Levy wrote an article for WIRED about The Race to Put Silk in Nearly Everything). 

Beyond Kevlar and natural polymers, plastics like polyethylene have made materials less expensive, and led to personal computers, cell phones, and sterile equipment used in medicine. Although polymers, like plastics, are generally made from fossil fuels, their role as a lightweight alternative to metal and wood helps reduce fossil fuel use in heating and transportation. Learn more about the complicated role of plastics and polymers in society from this book excerpt published in Scientific American, this TED-ED video about the history of plastic, and Patricia Villarrubia-Gómez’s TED talk. Today, many chemists advocate for a more sustainable approach to chemistry, called the Green Chemistry movement.

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