Biopolymer blends of polyhydroxybutyrate and polylactic acid reinforced with cellulose nanofibrils

Deniz Aydemir; Douglas J Gardner

doi:10.1016/j.carbpol.2020.116867

Biopolymer blends of polyhydroxybutyrate and polylactic acid reinforced with cellulose nanofibrils

Carbohydr Polym. 2020 Dec 15:250:116867. doi: 10.1016/j.carbpol.2020.116867. Epub 2020 Aug 7.

Authors

Deniz Aydemir¹, Douglas J Gardner²

Affiliations

¹ Bartin University, Faculty of Forestry, Department of Forest Industrial Engineering, 74100, Turkey; Advanced Structures and Composites Center, University of Maine, Orono, ME, 04469, USA. Electronic address: denizaydemir@bartin.edu.tr.
² Advanced Structures and Composites Center, University of Maine, Orono, ME, 04469, USA. Electronic address: douglasg@maine.edu.

PMID: 33049817
DOI: 10.1016/j.carbpol.2020.116867

Abstract

Poly(lactic acid) (PLA) was used in an effort to enhance the mechanical properties of poly(hydroxybutyrate) (PHB) and the blends were reinforced with cellulose nanofibrils (CNF). The conventional and dynamic mechanical, morphological, thermal and rheological properties of the obtained composite blends were determined. The results showed that the mechanical properties of neat PHB noticeably increased attributable to the good interaction between the biopolymers and CNF from the scanning electron microscopy (SEM) characterization. Thermal stability of the neat PHB was improved by adding PLA, however differential scanning calorimetry results showed that PLA created enhanced thermal properties while adding CNFs did not provide any change in the composite thermal properties. Dynamic mechanical and rheological properties of the neat PHB generally improved with both PLA and CNFs, however, it decreased at high loadings of CNFs attributed to fiber aggregations and fiber pull-out in comparison to the low loading level of CNF.

Keywords: Biopolymer blend composites; Biopolymer blends; Cellulose nanofibrils; Polyhydroxybutyrate; Polylactic acid.