| 초록 |
In recent years, much attention has been given to the environmental pollution from non-degradable plastic wastes. Countries worldwide have put much effort and emphasis on recycling and, at the same time, on the development of alternative degradable materials. As a biopolymer from agricultural resourses, starch is an attractive and economically feasible alternative material in developing degradable plastics. This study focused on maximizing the amount of starch and leaf powder in the polycaprolactone(PCL)/starch blends and also on maximizing the physical properties of the blends. Most of the synthetic polymers, however, are immiscible with starch and leaves. Consequently, the thermodynamic incompatibility usually leads to poor performance of the blended materials. So, in this work, a silane was used as a coupling agent to enhance compatibility between PCL and starch as well as leaf powder. After PCL and starch were blended by the ratio of 30/70, leaf powder was added to the blend by changing it's content from 5 to 20 phr. The content of the silane coupling agent was changed from 0.5 to 2 phr. The effect of silane modification on the tensile properties of the blends was investigated using a UTM. The thermal characteristics of the blends were examined by differential scanning calorimetry. Additionally, water absorption characteristics of the blends were estimated. The presence of the silane coupling agent extensively improved the physical properties of the blends. |
