Nomadolo Nomvuyo, Dada Omotola Esther, Swanepoel Andri, Mokhena Teboho, Muniyasamy Sudhakar
Centre for Nanostructures and Advanced Materials, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Pretoria 0001, South Africa.
Department of Chemistry, Nelson Mandela University, Port Elizabeth 6000, South Africa.
Polymers (Basel). 2022 May 5;14(9):1894. doi: 10.3390/polym14091894.
The aim of the present work is to evaluate the rate and mechanisms of the aerobic biodegradation of biopolymer blends under controlled composting conditions using the CO evolution respirometric method. The biopolymer blends of poly (butylene adipate terephthalate) (PBAT) blended with poly (lactic acid) (PLA), and PBAT blended with poly (butylene succinate) (PBS) by melt extrusion, were tested to evaluate the amount of carbon mineralized under home and industrial composting conditions. The changes in the structural, chemical, thermal and morphological characteristics of the biopolymer blends before and after biodegradation were investigated by FT-IR, DSC, TGA, XRD and SEM. Both blends showed higher degradation rates under industrial composting conditions, when compared to home composting conditions. This was confirmed by FT-IR analysis showing an increase in the intensity of hydroxyl and carbonyl absorption bands. SEM revealed that there was microbial colony formation and disintegration on the surfaces of the biopolymer blends. The obtained results suggest that industrial composting conditions are the most suitable for an enhanced biodegradation of the biopolymer blends viz PBAT-PBS and PBAT-PLA.
本研究的目的是使用二氧化碳释放呼吸测定法,评估在受控堆肥条件下生物聚合物共混物的好氧生物降解速率和机制。通过熔融挤出制备的聚(己二酸丁二醇酯对苯二甲酸酯)(PBAT)与聚(乳酸)(PLA)的共混物,以及PBAT与聚(丁二酸丁二醇酯)(PBS)的共混物,在家庭和工业堆肥条件下进行测试,以评估矿化碳的量。通过傅里叶变换红外光谱(FT-IR)、差示扫描量热法(DSC)、热重分析法(TGA)、X射线衍射(XRD)和扫描电子显微镜(SEM)研究了生物聚合物共混物在生物降解前后的结构、化学、热学和形态学特征变化。与家庭堆肥条件相比,两种共混物在工业堆肥条件下均表现出更高的降解速率。FT-IR分析证实了这一点,该分析显示羟基和羰基吸收带的强度增加。SEM显示在生物聚合物共混物表面有微生物菌落形成和分解。所得结果表明,工业堆肥条件最适合增强PBAT-PBS和PBAT-PLA等生物聚合物共混物的生物降解。