Effect of wood flour loading and thermal annealing on viscoelastic properties of poly(lactic acid) composite films

Abstract

Poly(lactic acid) (PLA) films filled with up to 50 wt % softwood flour were prepared by melt compounding and thermocompression. Thermal annealing of the melt was performed at temperatures from 90 C to 120 C, for 45 min. Responses on polymer-filler interactions, viscoelastic properties, crystallinity of PLA as well as PLA-wood flour-filled films were investigated by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The effectiveness of fillers on the storage moduli (C) was also calculated. The results reveal that wood flour (WF) in conjunction with thermal annealing affected the melting behavior of PLA matrix, and the glass transition temperature. It was further found that the effectiveness of the wood filler in biocomposites widely improved with thermal annealing as well as with higher WF concentration. Finally, it was found that the compatibility between WF and the PLA matrix can be improved when suitable annealing conditions are applied. V C 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl

Dynamic mechanical properties of PLA/PHBV, PLA/PCL, PHBV/PCL blends and their nanocomposites with TiO2 as nanofiller

“…Dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) gives information on the mechanical and rheological properties of materials, and is used to determine properties like temperatures of glass transitions and other relaxations, stress relaxation, dynamic fragility parameters, miscibility of polymer blends, interfacial compatibility of individual composite components, and filler effectiveness [11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18].…”

Biodegradable composition of poly(lactic acid) from renewable wood flour

“…using polyolefins, such as polypropylene and polyeth ylene [11].WF has also been reported to be used as bio degradable polymers (Reinsch et al [12], Fernandes et al [13], Wu [14], Shah et al [15], Sykacek et al [16], Gregorova et al [17][18][19], Hrabalova et al [20]). Some other reports discussed WF as a filler for PLA [21][22][23][24][25].…”

The Effect of Various Catalytic Systems on Solid-State Polymerization of Poly-(L-lactic acid)

“…M n = DP n × 72 + 18 (5) The molecular weights measured by the NMR method were less than the molecular weight measured by GPC method. We assume that two agglomeration processes occur, chemical and physical.…”