Polymers have many advantages such as low weight, low cost, and, importantly, stability under thermal, chemical, and mechanical stress. This stability, on the other hand, leads to criticism for causing environmental pollution on a macro-scale and via long-lasting microscopic plastic fragments (microplastics). Since it is very difficult but also very expensive to design brand-new materials that could both have the desired properties (mechanical, thermal, solvent resistance, etc.) and that are in the same time either recyclable and/or biodegradable, transforming already known materials to make them biodegradable/recyclable is more interesting. This approach relies on the introduction of labile/cleavable bonds onto the polymer backbone. The degradation could thus occur from these weak bonds leading to oligomers that could be easily recyclable and/or bioassimilable. This approach is currently applied to all polymerization techniques and led to interesting alternatives to numerous polymers ranging from polyolefins (polyethylene, polypropylene, …), polyethylene oxide, polyesters, polyamides, vinyl polymers, thermosets, etc. This review thus aimed at giving a comprehensive overview of the chemistries/monomers that could be used for the different polymerization processes but also described the alternatives to common polymers whatever the polymerization process. An emphasis will be put on the degradation/biodegradation/recycling properties of the new materials.

聚合物具有许多优点，例如重量轻、成本低，以及重要的是在热、化学和机械应力下的稳定性。另一方面，这种稳定性也因持久的微观塑料碎片（微塑料）造成宏观环境污染而受到批评。由于设计既具有所需性能（机械、热、耐溶剂性等）又同时可回收和/或可生物降解的全新材料非常困难，而且非常昂贵，因此改变了已知的材料使它们可生物降解/可回收的材料更有趣。该方法依赖于在聚合物主链上引入不稳定/可裂解键。因此，这些弱键可能会发生降解，从而产生易于回收和/或生物同化的低聚物。这种方法目前应用于所有聚合技术，并产生了多种聚合物的有趣替代品，包括聚烯烃（聚乙烯、聚丙烯等）、聚环氧乙烷、聚酯、聚酰胺、乙烯基聚合物、热固性材料等。因此，本综述旨在提供全面的了解概述了可用于不同聚合工艺的化学物质/单体，还描述了无论聚合工艺如何，普通聚合物的替代品。重点将放在新材料的降解/生物降解/回收性能上。