A Biodegradable Stereo-Complexed Poly (Lactic Acid) Drinking Straw of High Heat Resistance and Performance

Current biodegradable drinking straws suffer from poor heat resistance and rigidity when wet, causing user dissatisfaction. Here, a fully biodegradable straw formed by stereocomplexation of poly (lactic acid) (SC-PLA) is reported. Because of the unique strong interaction and high density of link cha...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Li, Renzhi, Feng, Yangyang, Gong, R. Hugh, Soutis, Constantinos
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Article
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10056377/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36984318
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ma16062438
Descripción
Sumario:Current biodegradable drinking straws suffer from poor heat resistance and rigidity when wet, causing user dissatisfaction. Here, a fully biodegradable straw formed by stereocomplexation of poly (lactic acid) (SC-PLA) is reported. Because of the unique strong interaction and high density of link chains between stereocomplex crystallites (over 70% crystallinity), SC-PLA straws outperform their counterparts on the market. This coupled with the advantages of simple processing (solution casting and annealing) and relatively low cost (~2.06 cents per straw) makes SC-PLA drinking straws a superior substitute for plastic ones. Commercially available PLLA straws lose almost 60% of their flexural strength when wet compared to less than 5% of the SC-PLA straws proposed in this study.

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