Journal of Polymers and the Environment

, Volume 19, Issue 1, pp 288–296 | Cite as

Effect of Nucleating Agents on Physical Properties of Poly(lactic acid) and Its Blend with Natural Rubber

Original Paper
First Online:

Abstract

Poly(lactic acid) (PLA) presents high strength and modulus, but very low toughness as well as slow crystallization. Natural rubber (NR) was blended to enhance the toughness and nucleating agent was added to improve the crystallization. Cyclodextrin (CD), considered as a green compound, as well as calcium carbonate (CaCO3) and talc were used as nucleating agents. Effects of these nucleating agents on crystallization, mechanical properties and morphology of neat PLA and PLA/NR blend were investigated. It was found that the addition of talc and CD decreased cold crystallization temperature (Tcc) of the PLA. Same result was obtained in PLA/NR blend containing talc. All nucleating agents increased the degree of crystallinity (ΧC) of PLA, whereas only talc and CaCO3 increased ΧC of PLA in PLA/NR blends. The enhanced toughness of PLA by the addition of nucleating agent was attributed to its increased crystallinity, as well as decreased spherulite size. For PLA/NR blends, the increase in toughness was mainly contributed by the presence of the rubber.

Keywords

Nucleating agent α-cyclodextrin Poly(lactic acid) Natural rubber 
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Notes

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the National Research Council of Thailand for financial support on this work. BS is also grateful to the Center of Excellence for Petroleum, Petrochemicals and Advanced Materials, Chulalongkorn University for his Master degree scholarship.

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Copyright information

© Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2010

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.School of Polymer Engineering, Institute of EngineeringSuranaree University of TechnologyNakhon RatchasimaThailand
  2. 2.Center of Excellence for Petroleum, Petrochemicals and Advanced MaterialsChulalongkorn UniversityBangkokThailand

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