Development and characterization of partially and/or completely biodegradable polymer films using cellulose

M. PEREDA; I. RACZ; N.E. MARCOVICH

Los Cocos, Córdoba, Argentina

Simposio; V Argentine-Chilean Polymer Symposium, ARCHIPOL V; 2009

Convenience and safety, low price and good aesthetic qualities are the most important factors determining rapid growth in the use of plastics for packaging. Most of these plastics are produced from fossil fuels, consumed and discarded into the environment, ending up as spontaneously non-degradable wastes. Thus, throughout the world today, the development of biodegradable materials with controlled properties has been a subject of great research challenge to the community of materials scientists and engineers (Quintavalla and Vicini, 2002). At present, cellulose-containing disperse systems, especially microcrystalline cellulose (MCC), are widely used in different industrial fields, such as pharmacy, perfumery, processing of food and plastics, etc. (Vasiliu-Oprea and Nicoleanu, 1993). It has been established that, when used as fillers in composites with other materials (plastics, polymer latexes, gum, etc.), they improve the physicomechanical properties of these materials (Laka and Chernyavskaya, 1996; Maskavs et al, 1999; Helbert et al, 1996). Thus, preparation and processing of biodegradable polymers and polymer-based composites, that is, green composites are the wave of the future and considered as the next generation materials. The goal of this work is to produce and characterize fully biodegradable composite films using sodium caseinate as polymeric matrix and micrcrystalline cellulose as reinforcement. The intended use of material is packaging, especially in the food industry. As reference material, PVC is also used as the non-degradable counterpart.