Monomer vs Polymer: What Are the Differences?

Did you know that there are 80,600 chemists employed in the United States?

They can make as much as $42 an hour on average, so there’s no doubt that it’s a wise career choice. If you’re interested in chemistry as a potential job or just for fun, then you should look into the magic of monomers and polymers.

Are you wondering if they are basically the same material? Keep reading to learn all about the differences between monomer vs polymer.

What Is a Monomer?

As the prefix “mono” in the word suggests, a monomer is a single unit and can act as a building block for larger materials. To bind monomers together, you’ll have to nurture a covalent bond; otherwise, they’ll fall apart. If you take only two monomers and bind them, you’ll have created a “dimer.”

There are many other wonders you can find in a monomer guide, such as trimers, tertrameters, and even pentamers. These bound monomers can either be made of the same molecule or a variety of them.

Since monomer structures are much smaller and lower in molecular weight, it’s important to treat them with care because they’re liable to break down more easily than a polymer.

Now that you’ve had a monomer explained to you in detail, you might still be asking yourself what a polymer is.

What Is a Polymer?

As you can probably guess based on the name, a polymer is many monomers bound together to create a macromolecule. Unlike monomers, polymers have a high molecular weight. While it’s possible to have a polymer that’s made from many different monomer types, a polymer that has the same repeating monomer in its structure is known as a “homo-polymer.”

As any polymer guide will confirm, there is also a couple of different ways to join the monomers together. A step-growth polymerization is one type of pattern. You also have the option of employing a chain-growth polymerization.

These patterns each have their own pros and cons, so the best one will depend on what your end goal is. You’ll be glad to know that there is a wide variety of natural and synthetic polymers that you can put to use, such as star polymers, brush polymers, comb polymers, ring blocks, and even a dumbbell.

Be sure to look into impellers for pumps so that you can accomplish even more chemistry feats.

Are You Ready to Choose Between Monomer Vs Polymer?

Now that you’ve learned all about the differences between monomer vs polymer, you can choose the one that is most suited to your needs. You may even want to use a combination of monomers and polymers depending on your project.

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