Rovibrational Spectroscopic Evaluation of Melt Extruded Semicrystalline Polymers
Sharaya Wells
Co-Presenters: Individual Presentation
College: Hennings College of Science Mathematics and Technology
Major: BS.BIO/CELL/MOLEC
Faculty Research Mentor: Brian Ree
Abstract:
Polylactic acid (PLA) is a biodegradable, aliphatic polyester derived from lactic acid. Given that it is biodegradable, it can be recycled after usage by remelting or hydrolyzing to lactic acid. A few general uses of PLA are that it can be used as 3D printing materials, for packaging materials and often it is used for netting for vegetation. Given how it is used as a 3D printing material, it does not need a heated bed of high temperatures to print. It can be printed at low temperatures. 3D printing can often yield inconsistency. Polymer can get affected by ambient atmosphere by way of moisture and humidity. This can affect the Polylactic acid material and how it gets printed on the hotbed.The temperature of the nozzle can affect how it gets printed on the bed and the shape it takes. If the temperature is too high, the PLA material can come out stringy. If the temperature is too cool, it will not adhere to the bed and will curl up around the nozzle. The thickness of the material, when printed on the bed, can affect how it's printed out of the nozzle and how long it takes to print.The utilization of accessible tools (such as FTIR) for evaluating fundamental polymer behavior can reveal to us polymer behaviors at the fundamental level and what ultimately determines overall physical behaviors. FTIR was used to see polymer composition and intermolecular interactions. Polylactic acid was printed in strips with each strip having a slightly higher width than the last. FTIR was then used to see the intramolecular bonds of the material. PLA strips with thicker widths had sharper peaks around the 2790-3020 range. This is due to C-H bonds stretching (possible alkanes/alkenes) Around the range of around 3350, we witnessed softer more hill-like peaks indicating broad, strong O-H bonds (alcohol). This research was conducted to target the performing quantitative data measurements and analyze the rovibrational spectra on melt extruded semicrystalline polymers (PLA).