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How do you get from beetles to The Beatles? The answer is PVC. Before the 1950s most records were made from compounds of shellac and wood flour. Shellac, a natural polymer, is a resin secreted from the female Kerria lacca insect 8 April 2013

In the mid-1960s it was the holy grail of furniture design: the chair made from a single piece of material. Many designers achieved this aim but the results were never as neat as their designers would have liked. The ultimate aim was a chair created from a single shot injection moulding. Verner Panton’s eponymous chair (see Design Landmark, December 2012) had this ambition but was originally made from polyurethane with a lacquered finish. It wasn’t until 1999, a year after Panton’s death, that his chair was injection moulded. 7 March 2013

Since its launch in 2007 the Amazon Kindle has transformed the way readers consume print media, creating debate and even striking fears over the death of the printed book 4 February 2013

The history of passenger aviation is full of what nearly-happened. And it’s no different with the 787, Boeing’s first ‘plastic’ aircraft 4 January 2013

Found on many an aunt's sideboard - or your grandmother's kitchen - Guzzini's generation jumping design is more than good aesthetics. The Guzzini salad bowl, still available today, was born of an ingenious moulding process patented nearly 50 years ago 22 October 2012

In 1978, two young entrepreneurs and two professors teamed up to create the Autolet, a device for making diabetes testing easier 17 July 2012

In a major British design retrospective taking place at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, one innovative exhibit is the injection moulded Topper sailing dinghy. The polypropylene dinghy has, for the past 35 years, provided the first sailing experience for many enthusiasts 25 May 2012

Swimming coach and entrepreneur Tony Godfrey launched the first goggles for swimmers in 1969 and marketed them directly via clubs and mail order. The design has since been widely copied and pirated but never changed. The goggles are still made in the same moulds on behalf of his company, now called Swimgear of London 30 April 2012

The innovative Bobble drinking water bottle, which has won rave reviews for its design, came about when the founders of the US-based Move Collective decided to make bottled water more sustainable 26 March 2012

The Lancia Stratos was a rally legend of the 1970s, combining aerodynamic efficiency with engineering muscle. The road version was equally uncompromising: it stood just 1.08m high, was mounted on a short steel chassis, and its body was moulded from glass reinforced plastics 27 February 2012

Airfix, founded in the UK in 1939 by Hungarian émigré Nicolas Kove, began by manufacturing air-filled rubber toys. In 1947, the company switched production to plastic pocket combs, reputedly using the UK's first injection moulding machines 30 January 2012

• Invista takes next step toward Chinese nylon 6/6 plant 17 May 2013
• Nanotechnology conference comes to Dublin 20 May 2013
• Coca-Cola invests in Greek recycling 21 May 2013
• Legal move from Milliken over patent violation 20 May 2013
• Piovan introduces products to South America 21 May 2013

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• Invista takes next step toward Chinese nylon 6/6 plant 17 May 2013
• OMV to invest €230m to boost butadiene capacity 16 May 2013
• Masterchem defies the economic slowdown to invest 17 May 2013

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