ARS | Publication request: TENSILE AND FLEXURAL PROPERTIES OF BM0 TO BM20 BIOCOMPOSITES

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: November 16, 2007
Publication Date: May 8, 2008
Citation: Onwulata, C.I., Tomasula, P.M. 2008. Tensile and flexural properties of bm0 to bm20 biocomposites. Meeting Abstract.

Technical Abstract: Plastic products containing up to 20% biomass (BM20) will meet the goal of U.S. Executive Order 13101 mandating that goods purchased by the Federal Government contain biobased or recycled materials. The availability of products in the marketplace containing biobased materials such as poly(lactic) acid (PLA), which can replace plastics such as polyethylene (PE), are limited. In this study, we used DBP (dairy-based bioplastics) to replace up to 10% of PE or 20% of PLA in injection – molded products. DBP are materials containing 40 wt% dairy proteins that are reactively extruded with acetic acid. DBP pellets used for injection molding ranged in size from 150 to 300 microns, with moisture content of 12 g/100g, and density of 1.2 g/cm3. The peak tensile stress averaged 2.0 MPa; elongation to break, 4.4 mm; and storage modulus, 23.8 MPa. Adding 10 wt% DBP pellets in PE increased storage modulus 160 MPa or 36%, loss modulus 70 MPa or 12%; tan d was reduced 0.15 or 32%. Adding 20 wt% DBP pellets in PLA decreased storage modulus 340 MPa or 14%, loss modulus 18 MPa or 12%; tan d was not changed. These results demonstrate that reactively extruded DBP have the potential to extend molded products PE or PLA based materials, but their effects vary.