Amar K. Mohanty, Schoool of Packaging, Michigan State University, 2527 Engineering Building, East Lansing, MI 48824-1226 and Rahul Bhardwaj, School of Packaging, Michigan State University, Michigan State University, 130 Packaging Building, East Lansing, MI 48824-1223.
Truly green composites are emerging as sustainable alternatives to the conventional polymer composites due to their renewability and biodegradability. Poly (lactic acid), (PLA) is one of the emerging bioplastics. Hyperbranched polymers (HBP) are the promising new class of novel polymers. Their unique molecular architecture and properties set them apart from the conventional polymers. There is a great possibility to utilize these polymers for the modification of the linear polymers. This paper presents a novel technique to improve the properties of PLA by in-situ tailoring the architecture of a hyperbranched polymer. A strong and tough PLA based composition was fabricated by confining the hyperbranched polymer based nanostructures in its matrix. The elongation at break of PLA was improved by ~1000% when modified with tailored HBP. Interestingly, the tensile modulus of PLA was almost unaffected after modification. The modified PLA bioplastic on reinforcement with nanoclay/or talc followed by natural fiber can generate truly green hierarchical nano-biocomposites.