Biodegradable poly(butylene succinate‐co‐butylene furandicarboxylate): Effect of butylene furandicarboxylate unit on thermal, mechanical, and ultraviolet shielding properties, and biodegradability

Abstract

Biobased co-polyesters poly(butylene succinate-co-butylene furandicarboxylate) (PBSF) is prepared by transesterification and polycondensation of dimethyl succinate (DSMu), dimethyl 2,5-furandicarboxylate (MDFD) and 1,4-butanediol (1,4-BDO). GPC analysis shows that PBSF has high molecular weight with weight average molecular weight (M w ) up to 11 Â 10 4 g/mol. Due to the low -COOH content, PBSF also has excellent thermal stability, which is beneficial to the polyester processing. Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) analysis shows that PBSF are semi-crystalline materials, with T m ranging from 116 to 101 C. Tensile tests showed that theses polymers possess high tensile strength (30-22 MPa) and elongation at break as high as 562%, which is prominently higher than that of commercial poly(butylene succinate) (PBS) and most biodegradable packaging materials. It should be noted that the increase of BF units improves the UV shielding properties of polyester materials. Moreover, the incorporation of furan ring promoted the enzymatic degradation of PBS, and PBSF showed a significantly faster biodegradation rate when the BF unit content is 5%. PBSF polyester has excellent thermal properties, tensile properties, UV shielding properties and biodegradable properties. Therefore, these new bio-based polymers have great potential to be applied as environmentally friendly and sustainable plastic packaging.

Synthesis and Properties of Polybutylene (Succinate)-b-poly(dimethylsiloxane) with Unprecedented Combined Performance and Functions

“…These results indicated the existence of a repeating unit of PBS in the copolymers . It could be seen from Figure (1) that the bands around 1050, 1310, and 870 cm –1 correspond to Si–O–Si stretching vibration, C–H of the Si-CH 3 stretching vibration, and bending vibration, respectively . As shown in Figure (3), the absorption band of the C–H bending vibration was fitted by peak splitting, and the C–H bending vibration absorption peak on repeating units of PDMS could be found at 1045 cm –1 .…”

“…The disappearance of protons on methyl in DMS at 3.95 ppm indicated that DMS completely reacted and formed covalent bonds in the macromolecular chain of the copolymers. The peaks appearing at 1.7 and 4.1 ppm were attributed to the H of the methylene on the BDO residual in the macromolecular structure, and the peak of the DMS residual in the macromolecular structure was observed at 2.7 ppm . The 1 H-signal on the PDMS appeared at around 0.1 ppm .…”

“…23 It could be seen from Figure 2(1) that the bands around 1050, 1310, and 870 cm −1 correspond to Si−O−Si stretching vibration, C−H of the Si-CH 3 stretching vibration, and bending vibration, respectively. 8 As shown in Figure 2(3), the absorption band of the C−H bending vibration was fitted by peak splitting, and the C−H bending vibration absorption peak on repeating units of PDMS could be found at 1045 cm −1 . The characteristic peak of PDMS in the FT-IR spectra at 870 cm −1 testified to the existence of PDMS blocks in the macromolecular chain.…”

“…The reported M w of the PBS homopolymer by the transesterification method was 3.51 × 10 4 g/mol. 8,9 In our previous work, the M w of pure PBS synthesized by the transesterification method was 10.7 × 10 4 g/mol and the PDI was 1.85. 24 In this work, the M w of the PBS-b-PDMS was higher than that of PBS.…”

“…The peaks appearing at 1.7 and 4.1 ppm were attributed to the H of the methylene on the BDO residual in the macromolecular structure, and the peak of the DMS residual in the macromolecular structure was observed at 2.7 ppm. 8 The 1 H-signal on the PDMS appeared at around 0.1 ppm. 21 The appearance of 1 H-signals at 0.1 ppm was due to the slight side reactions of the PDMS block when the content of the PDMS block was 2−4 mol %.…”