What is Polycarbonates???

Polycarbonates are a particular group of thermoplastics. These plastics are widely used in modern industries manufacturing as they are easily worked, molded, and thermoformed. The reason why they are called polycarbonates are because they are polymers having functional groups linked together by carbonate groups (-O_(C=O)-O-) in a long molecular chain. Besides carbon monoxide was used as a C1-synthon on an industrial scale to produce diphenyl carbonate, being later trans-esterificated with a diphenolic derivative affording polyaromatic carbonates. The C1-synthon can be divided into polyaromatic carbonates and polyaliphatic carbonates. The polyaliphatic carbonates are a product of the reaction of carbon dioxide with epoxides, what owing to the thermodynamical stability of carbon dioxide requires the use of catalyst. The working systems are based on porphyrins, alkoxides, carboxylates, salens and beta-diiminates as rganic, chelating ligands and aluminium, zinc, cobalt and chromium as the metal centres. Polyaliphatic carbonates display promising characteristics of having a better biodegradability than the aromatic ones and could be employed to develop other speciality polymers.

Advantages
-Durable material
-Can be laminated to make bullet-proof ‘glass’
-Bullet-resistance
-Stronger but more expensive
-Highly transparent to visible light
-Good light transmission

Uses
-Making eyeglasses lenses as it has high optical and mechanical properties
-Uses in making compact disks as it is tough and durable
-Making polycarbonate lenses that blocks ultra-violet (UV) rays
-Used in electronics industries