Wacky World of Rubber: Cooking polymers with food

It's often said making a rubber compound is like cooking, a lot of trial and error to find the exact proportions, the perfect recipe.

The University of Akron is taking that statement to heart.

"Polymer Science of Cooking," a course developed for the spring semester of 2019, focuses on the basic concepts of polymer science for undergraduate and honors students. It uses common foods, such as ice cream and Jell-O, to illustrate the interaction of polymers (large molecules found in plastic, rubber and DNA).

The course is a natural sciences colloquium and will be held in the Drs. Gary B. and Pamela S. Williams Honors College.

The course was developed by Hunter King, assistant professor of polymer science; and fifth-year graduate student Michael Wilson, who is working in the lab of Ali Dhinojwala, interim dean of the College of Polymer Science and Polymer Engineering.

According to the school, the pair had previously discussed the overlap in the fundamental concepts in polymer science and those of food processing and cooking, and thought the relationship would make for a class.

"This class will be a very good introduction for polymer science topics that would normally be technical," King said in a statement. "The material for this course is in the make-up of different kinds of foods that people are familiar with, but will be interpreted from a scientific perspective."

The school added that the class will be held every Thursday with activity- and project-based assignments using cooking demonstrations to represent basic scientific concepts, such as crystallization and crosslinking. A final project will require students to design experiments around food to demonstrate principles they learned.

For example, King said ice cream can be used to explain crystallization. Microcrystals are frozen within the cream in a particular way to avoid producing one continuous, uneatable crystal. This process can help explain the kinetics of crystallization, and the difference between quenching and annealing a material.

Jell-O is also a hydrogel, but a special type that can be reprocessed. Wilson said some behaviors typical of hydrogels in general, such as the brittleness or pliability depending on whether it is dry or wet, can be experienced tangibly with Jell-O.

The course will also require students to describe different types of food or ingredients in terms of mechanical properties. For instance, Tootsie Rolls and marshmallows are both are soft, but in very different ways. The Tootsie Roll is stiffer and more plastic, but the marshmallow is softer and more elastic.

However you describe them, they're both delicious.

Chris Sweeney is not much of a cook, whether its polymers or food, but knows his ice cream. Follow him on Twitter @CSweeneyRPN.