GUM 
Daniel Tratter

Supervisors_ Prof. Jozef Legrad, Prof. Holger Neumann, Anja Lapatsch 

BA Graduation Project_  Daniel Tratter

According to media reports, every German consumes around 100 chewing gums a year, resulting in a total consumption of 8 billion per year. On the average, there are 80 chewing gums gluing on every square meters of street in Germany. Removing them costs between 1 – 3 € per piece because the „gum base“, the main ingredient of chewing gum, consists mainly of petroleum-based plastic.

Therefore, chewing gum, like other plastic products, is not easily biodegradable (demonstrably needing several years).

So it´s a waste of resources that is both, harmful to the environment and expensive.

That was the starting point of my bachelor thesis „GUM“, which dealt with the development of a material from already used chewing gum.

The aim was to produce high-quality materials from chewed chewing gum as recycled plastic through modification and extrusion and then processing it further on. The chewed gum is re-integrated into an economic cycle so that the ingredients do not end up on the street and unnoticed.

The resulting material is used to develop everyday objects that, like chewing gum, sweeten the everyday life.