%0 Journal Article
%T Highly crystallized poly (lactic acid) under high pressure
%A Jin Zhang
%A Ding-Xiang Yan
%A Jia-Zhuang Xu
%A Hua-Dong Huang
%J AIP Advances
%D 2012
%I AIP Publishing LLC
%R 10.1063/1.4769351
%X Biodegradable poly (lactic acid) (PLA) usually has a crystallinity less than 10% due to its poor crystallization ability. In this work, we found high pressure could significantly facilitate formation of crystallites of PLA, resulting in a crystallinity high up to 66.3% at pressure and temperature of 300 MPa and 185 oC. High-pressure induced crystalline reorganization and lamellar thickening led to two melting temperatures in the highly crystallized PLA but without cold crystallization compared to the normal-pressure crystallized PLA. Temperature dependence of high-pressure crystallization of PLA suggested desirable crystallization temperatures for highly crystallized PLA products.
%U http://link.aip.org/link/doi/10.1063/1.4769351