Mechanical Properties of Polylactic Acid/Montmorillonite/Chitin Nanowhiskers Composite films

Siti Ruhana Mohd Hanafi, Zainoha Zakaria

Abstract


In this work, polylactic acid (PLA) is an aliphatic polyester which has good biodegradability and commonly used in food packaging industry. Regarding to its drawback such as brittleness, poor water vapour or gas barrier properties and low thermal stability, this study focuses on mechanical and thermal properties. One of the ways to enhance the properties of the polymer is through the incorporation of additives or filler. Montmorillonite at optimum content is 5 phr, (MMT5) and various chitin nanowhisker (CHW) content (1, 2, 3, 4 phr) was used as filler in PLA through solution casting method. The mechanical and thermal properties of PLA/MMT5 and PLA/MMT5/CHW composite films were investigated using tensile test and Thermogravimetric Analysis (TGA) respectively. The result for tensile test focused on tensile strength, elongation at break and Young’s modulus. Tensile strength of PLA/MMT5 decreased when addition of CHW content. While for the Young’s modulus and elongation at break, the composite films increased when 1 and 2 phr CHW content were added into the PLA/MMT5. In TGA, the result showed that the thermal stability increased upon addition of CHW. In addition, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) was used to identify functional group and positive interaction in the composites. The IR spectrum affirmed that there are no significant different when added CHW content into the PLA/MMT5 films.

Keywords


polylactic acid; chitin nanowhisker; montmorillonite; incorporation of filler

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