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Thermal, crystallization, and mechanical properties of polylactic acid (PLA)/poly(butylene succinate) (PBS) blends

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Abstract

A environment-friendly polymer blends were prepared by the basis of bio-sourced polylactide (PLA) and aliphatic poly(butylene succinate) (PBS) via melt compounding process. 1,4-butanediol and succinic acid was used together with tetrabutyltitanate as catalyst to synthesize PBS via esterified and polycondensation. The chemical structure of PBS was studied by 1H NMR and FT-IR spectroscopy. The effects PBS content on thermal behavior, mechanical properties, phase morphology, and thermal stability of PLA/PBS blends were systematically investigated. DSC and DMA results showed that glass transition temperature (Tg) and cool crystallizaiton temperature (Tcc) of PLA was influenced by PBS. The different phase morphologies of the PLA/PBS blends formed after addition of PBS into PLA. The various phase morphologies from that blend influenced the rheological behavior and further influenced the mechanical properties in PLA/PBS blends, the well dispersed PBS increased the elongation at break of 8.1 ± 0.1 kJ/m2 with around 80.0% over than neat the PLA. Finally, the PLA/PBS blends have excellent mechanical and thermal properties by analyzing the toughening mechanism and crystallization morphology.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by Jilin Provincial Science and Technology Department Project (No.20220203019SF), Jilin Provincial Development and Reform Commission Project (No.2022C039-3), Science and Technology Bureau of Jilin Province of China (No.20210509017RQ), Program of Changchun Science and Technology Bureau (No. 21KY01), and the Natural Science Foundation of Hebei Province, China (E2021202035).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Hebei Key Laboratory of Functional Polymers, School of Chemical Engineering and Technology, Hebei University of Technology, Tianjin, 300130, China

    Tao Zhao, Xingyang zhang, Wenshuang Han, Shuo zhang, Qingxin Zhang & Xiaoyan Yu

  2. Key Laboratory of Polymer Ecomaterials, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Changchun, 130022, China

    Tao Zhao, Jinshuo Yu, Hongwei Pan, Junjia Bian & Huiliang Zhang

  3. Engineering Research Center of Synthetic Resin and Special Fiber, Ministry of Education, Changchun University of Technology, Changchun, 130012, China

    Jinshuo Yu

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  1. Tao Zhao
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Correspondence to Hongwei Pan or Xiaoyan Yu.

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Zhao, T., Yu, J., zhang, X. et al. Thermal, crystallization, and mechanical properties of polylactic acid (PLA)/poly(butylene succinate) (PBS) blends. Polym. Bull. 81, 2481–2504 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00289-023-04848-9

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