聚合物和生物聚合物之间的差异

Thekey differencebetween polymer and biopolymer is大多数聚合物是不可降解的，而生物聚合物是可降解的。

Polymers are giant molecules having many repeating units. These repeating units represent themonomersthat build up the polymer material. On the other hand, biopolymers are the polymer materials that occur in biological systems.

内容

1.Overview and Key Difference
2.什么是聚合物
3.What is Biopolymer
4.Side by Side Comparison – Polymer vs Biopolymer in Tabular Form
5.概括

什么是聚合物?

Polymers are large molecules that have the same structural unit repeating over and over. These repeating units represent monomers. These monomers bind with each other viacovalent bonds形成聚合物。它们的分子量很高，组成了10,000多个原子。在综合过程中（polymerization), longer polymer chains form.

Furthermore, there are two main types of polymers depending on their nature. They are the natural and synthetic polymers. Natural polymers are the materials that we can find in nature while synthetic polymers are the man-made materials. The polymer material that forms inside biological systems is named as biopolymers.

同样，根据合成过程，有两种形式的聚合物。他们是addition and condensation polymers. If the monomers have double bonds between carbon atoms their polymerization forms addition polymers. In some of the polymerization reactions, when two monomers join with each other, a small molecule like water releases. Such polymers are condensation polymers. Furthermore, there are many ways that we can classify polymer materials; according to the properties, structure, sources, etc.

What is Biopolymer?

Biopolymers are polymer materials that form in living organisms. There are three main biopolymers in living systems; polysaccharides, proteins and polynucleotides (nucleic acids). The structural unit of polysaccharides is monosaccharides (sugars). When two monosaccharides join together to form a glycosidic bond, it releases a water molecule. Therefore, polysaccharides are condensation polymers. Polysaccharides play structural and functional roles in organisms. Glycogen is a storage polysaccharide, whereas cellulose is a component in the cell walls of plant cells. Glucose is the monomer for both glycogen and cellulose polymers.

Proteins are consisting of polypeptides, which are biopolymers of amino acid monomers. Amino acids form peptide bonds with each other during the polymerization process. Therefore, the proteins have peptide bonds between its repeating units. Polynucleotides is another important type of biopolymer. DNA and RNA are the two vital polynucleotides that we can find in organisms. The synthesis process of biopolymers is a dehydration process, where a water molecule releases with the formation of a covalent bond.

Biopolymers are very complex, and there is a wide variety of them. Likewise, they can be linear or branched, and the folding patterns are unique to each biopolymer. Unlike synthetic polymers, biopolymers are easily degradable. Hence we can use them to replace some of the synthetic polymers.

这些材料通过酶进行水解，否则它们可以通过加热，添加化学物质或机械力进行变性。此外，这些聚合物具有定义且非常具体的结构，因为生物系统具有高度选择性。除此之外，这些材料从生物系统内的模板中合成。例如，从现有DNA形成新的DNA作为模板。

聚合物和生物聚合物有什么区别？

Polymers are large molecules that have the same structural unit repeating over and over while biopolymers are polymer materials that form in living organisms. The key difference between polymer and biopolymer is that most of the polymers are non-degradable whereas biopolymers are degradable. Another important difference between polymer and biopolymer is that polymers can have either simple or complex structures while biopolymers mostly have complex structures.

以下信息在polyme之间的区别r and biopolymer shows more details on the differences.

概括– Polymer vs Biopolymer

生物聚合物是在生物系统内发生的一种聚合物。聚合物和生物聚合物之间的主要区别在于，大多数聚合物是不可降解的，而生物聚合物是可降解的。

Reference:

1. “Biopolymer.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 31 Oct. 2018.Available here
2. “Polymer.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 5 Nov. 2018.Available here

Image Courtesy:

1.”Plastic beads2″By No machine-readable author provided.(CC BY 2.5)viaCommons Wikimedia
2.”ADN animation”By brian0918™ – Own work, (Public Domain) viaCommons Wikimedia