Long carbon chain thermoplastic polyamide elastomer (TPAE) with PA1212 as hard segment and polytetrahydrofuran as soft segment was synthesized successfully. Subsequently, thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) incorporated to compensate for the high cost of TPAE and improved the foaming performance, in which a chain extender (ADR) was applied to enhance melt strength and interfacial compatibility simultaneously. The effect of ADR content on the mechanical, thermal, rheological, and foaming properties of TPAE/TPU composites were investigated in detail. It was found that the composite foams showed a more perfect cell structure, high cell density, and increased expansion ratio because of the enhanced melt strength and interfacial compatibility, when ADR was incorporated. With the increase of ADR content, the cell size and expansion ratio of the composite foams with TPU content of 30% showed a trend of first increasing and the following decreasing. The cell size reached a maximum value when the content of ADR was 2%, which was 25.81 μm. Consequently, the obtained TPAE/TPU composite foams showed an outstanding compressive modulus and resilient performance to broaden its application in footwear industry.
Environmentally friendly foams have been studied extensively to handle the plastic pollution caused by disposable tableware. Herein, biodegradable poly (lactic acid) (PLA) – poly (butylene adipate-co-terephthalate) (PBAT) composites were first fabricated by melt blending, in which a reactive chain extender (ADR) was incorporated to enhance the interfacial compatibility and melt strength, a nucleating agent (TMC) was applied to improve the crystallinity. Subsequently, the foaming behavior of the composites was investigated via supercritical CO2 foaming. Specifically, a spherulite and shish-kebab-like nanoporous structure was observed from PLA and PLA/TMC foams, respectively, when the soaking temperature was far below melting temperature. With an increase of foaming temperature, the unmelted completely crystals served as physical cross-linking points, also contributing to a high melt strength. Combined with chain extension reaction of ADR, the PLA–PBAT/ADR/TMC foams showed the largest cell diameter and expansion ratio, which were 19 μm and 8.9, respectively. Furthermore, the heat resistance of PLA–PBAT/ADR/TMC foams was also significantly improved, owing to the high crystallinity induced by TMC. Consequently, the composite foams with superior heat resistance and toughness were obtained to broaden its application as biodegradable disposable tableware for hot food.
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