The use of biopolymer‐based drug delivery systems is increasing in the pharmaceutical area due to them biodegradable and biocompatible properties. In this work, a poly (butylene succinate) (PBS) grafted with poly (hydroxypropyl methacrylate) (PHPMA), PBSgPHPMA, is prepared using maleic unsaturations inserted in the PBS chain during its synthesis. Several characterization techniques are used to study the homopolymers and the grafted material. Among them, Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR), Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), and X‐ray diffraction (XRD) allowed inferring the obtaining of the aimed materials. Also, the copolymer is used to prepare microparticles containing Meloxicam by emulsification and solvent evaporation method. These microparticles are tested as drug delivery systems under pH 8.5 (gastrointestinal) and pH 5.5 (skin). The primary results allowed inferring that the grafted material can be used as a drug delivery system, showing that the release rate at pH 5.5 allowed the slower delivery rate among tested materials.

Environmental impacts are increasingly due to the human polluting activities. Therefore, there is a need to develop technologies capable of removing contamination and driving the impacted environment as close as possible to its inherent characteristics. One of the major problems still faced is the spill of oil into water. Therefore, to solve the environmental problem, this work shows the use of magnetically modified geopolymer materials as an oil remover from water with a magnet’s aid. The results obtained were outstanding since the average intrinsic oil removal capability (IORC) was 150 g/g. The presented IORC is the largest found in the materials produced by our research group, constituting an extremely encouraging result, mainly because of the ease of preparing the magnetic geopolymer system. Furthermore, the low cost of production and the material’s capability to be reused as filler of polymer or even cementitious matrices allows us to project that this nanocomposite can be widely used, constituting an economically viable alternative for more efficient environmental recovery processes.

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The determination of the molar mass of a polymer is a fundamental characterization. One of the most common techniques used for this purpose is gel permeation chromatography (GPC). However, the most used columns are not appropriate for low molar mass polymers, presenting results that are different from reality. For these cases, it is possible to use the nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) technique to obtain molar mass values (based on calculations associated with spectra signals and the quantity of the polymer used in the analysis). However, in some cases, the resultant signals of different chain portions can be presented in the same spectral region, hampering calculations. Thus, this paper proposes the use of an external standard. This way, it can correlate to the molar mass of four different samples of poly(butylene succinate) (PBS) with different molar mass values. The results based on NMR spectra were different from those found using GPC, but both increased in the same proportion (R² = 0.8828). Since NMR presents an absolute result, it seems to be the most accurate result. This analysis method also allows us to quantify the experimental percentage of unsaturation, which was lower than the theoretical one due to losses during the PBS synthesis.

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Insofar the cost of repairing concrete structures reaches the trillions of dollars, new technologies, such as concrete self-healing, are investigated continuously. Consequently, the main objective of this work is on the production of a cheap and easy-to-make material, which can be used in large-scale applications, besides presenting similar results as other ones more complex systems. In brief, a core-shell system is produced and investigated as a self-healing agent. Aiming this, a mix of gelatin and sodium silicate (Na 2 SiO 3 ) is used as the core, while poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) is the glutaraldehyde crosslinked shell. The obtained materials are characterized using several techniques, such as Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), as well as, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). FTIR proves the obtaining of the proposed system. In turn, TGA and DSC showed that the material could endure real-life applications. Also, granulometry tests show that the obtained materials are mostly in the micrometric scale. The Na 2 SiO 3 release is especially tested in aqueous media, proving the core-shell system swells, releasing its active agent. Thereby, the obtained results allow concluding that the presented core-shell material is useful to the self-healing applications.