Science Advances 19 Aug 2020:
Vol. 6, no. 34, eabc0495
DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abc0495

Changxia Shi1,2, Michael L. McGraw1, Zi-Chen Li2, Luigi Cavallo3, Laura Falivene3,* and Eugene Y.-X. Chen1

INTRODUCTION


The failure to address end-of-life issues of today’s plastics has not only accelerated the depletion of finite natural resources but also caused severe worldwide plastics pollution problems and resulted in enormous energy and materials value loss in the global economy (13). To address this global challenge, the design of next-generation polymers must consider their afterlife issues and establish closed-loop life cycles toward a circular economy (48). In this context, the development of chemically recyclable polymers that can be depolymerized back to their monomer building blocks in high selectivity and purity for virgin-quality polymer reproduction offers a circular economy approach to address these dire environmental and economic issues (916).