pps proceeding - Abstract Preview
pps proceeding
Symposium: S04 - (General Session 4) Polymer Blends and Alloys
Oral Presentation
 
 

Accelerating the crystallization of commercial Poly(L-lactide) with stereocomplex crystallites, PLLA and PDLA homocrystallites

YANG Wei (1)*, Bao Rui-Ying (1), Wei Xin-Feng (1), Yin Hai-Yan (1), Xie Bang-Hu (1), Yang Ming-Bo (1)

(1) College of Polymer Science and Engineering, Sichuan University - Sichuan - China

Due to the excellent performances in renewability, biodegradability, biocompatibility and processability, Poly(L-lactide) (PLLA), the most promising biopolymers, holds great potential for industrial applications such as biomedical devices, packaging and automotive industries and substitutions of petroleum-based polymers. However, under practical processing (e.g., injection molding), PLLA articles exhibit poor mechanical performance above glass transition temperature (around 60 oC) since they remains almost amorphous after processing due to the extremely slow crystallization rate, which also results in elevated mold temperature, prolonged molding cycles and improved difficulties in part ejection. Therefore, accelerating the crystallization of PLLA to enlarge its application is urgent and has caught continuous attention from both academics and industries. In our work, the crystallization promotion effect of stereocomplex crystallites (sc) formed from PLLA and Poly(d-lactide) (PLLA) at a temperature between the melting points of PLLA, PDLA and SC crystallites, high-melting-point and high-crystallinity PLLA homocrystallites and high-melting-point and high-crystallinity PDLA homocrystallites were studied. The results showed that the crystallization accelerating effect of sc crystallites is better than widely reported inorganic nucleating agent, talc and the presence of shear and plasticizer, PEG, can further enhance the crystallization accelerating effect of sc crystallites. However, the crystallization accelerating effect of sc crystallites is still limited, especially under high cooling rate. In this case, high-melting-point and high-crystallinity PLLA or PDLA homocrystallites show much better crystallization promoting effect for commercial PLLA.