Ingredients --

Vinyl acetate

Chemical Formula:

Synonyms

poly(vinyl acetate),
PVA,
Vinyl Acetate/Crotonates/Vinyl Neodecanoate Copolymer

Description

White powder

Uses

Polyvinyl acetate is an ingredient in white glue, and is a copolymer with vinyl alcohol in latex paints.

copolymer of vinyl acetate and vinyl alcohol

It is a copolymer with poly methyl methacrylate (PMMA) in acrylic latex paints, where the hydrophobic PMMA is surrounded by hydrophilic polyvinyl acetate molecules.

Such a suspension of a hydrophobic polymer wrapped in a hydrophilic polymer is called a latex.

A copolymer is a polymer made up of two or more different building blocks, called monomers.

Chemistry lesson

Many common plastics are made from simple building blocks called vinyl monomers. These are little molecules that contain carbon double bonds. The simplest one is ethylene.

Ethylene molecules can join together into immensly long chains, converting the double bond into a single bond as they join to become polyethylene.

When the propylene molecule polymerizes, we get polypropylene.

When the vinyl chloride molecule polymerizes, we get polyvinylchloride (PVC).

When the styrene molecule polymerizes, we get polystyrene (Styrofoam).

When the methyl methacrylate molecule polymerizes, we get polymethylmethacrylate (Plexiglas).

When the tetrafluoroethylene molecule polymerizes, we get polytetrafluoroethylene.

more commonly known as Teflon.