Copolyesters Based on 2,5-Furandicarboxylic Acid (FDCA): Effect of 2,2,4,4-Tetramethyl-1,3-Cyclobutanediol Units on Their Properties.

Jinggang Wang,Xiaoqing Liu,Jin Zhu,Yanhua Jiang

doi:10.3390/polym9090305

Abstract

Bio-based polyesters derived from 2,5-furandicarboxylic acid (FDCA), including poly (ethylene 2,5-furandicarboxylate) (PEF), poly(propylene 2,5-furandicarboxylate) (PPF), and poly(butylene 2,5-furandicarboxylate) (PBF) have been synthesized and modified with 2,2,4,4-tetramethyl-1,3-cyclobutanediol (CBDO). Copolyesters with increased glass transition temperature, good barrier and better mechanical properties, as well as higher transparency were reported in this work. The chemical structures, composition, and sequence distribution of the copolyesters were determined by 1H NMR and 13C NMR. The degree of random (R) was close to 1 for all the copolyesters, indicating their random chemical structures. With the introduction of 10% CBDO units, the semi-crystalline PEF and PPF were changed into completely amorphous polyesters and the higher transparency was easily achieved. The glass transition temperature was increased from 87 °C for PEF to 91.1 °C for PETF-18, from 55.5 °C for PPF to 63.5 °C for PPTF-18, and from 39.0 °C for PBF to 43.5 °C for PBTF-18. The barrier properties investigation demonstrated that although the O2 and CO2 barrier of PEF/PPF/PBF were decreased by the addition of CBDO units, the modified copolyesters still showed good barrier properties.

Highlights

In recent years, due to diminishing crude oil reserves and worsening environmental pollution, more and more attention has been paid to the synthesis of polymers derived from renewable resources to replace the petroleum-based ones
The furandicarboxylic acid (FDCA)-based polyesters (PEF, PPF, PBF) and copolyesters (PETF-10, PPTF-10, PBTF-10, PETF-18, PPTF-18, and PBTF-18) were synthesized following a two-step procedure consisting of transesterification and polycondensation shown in Scheme 1
With the introduction of CBDO, the crystallizability of the copolyesters was the glass transition signals. These results indicated that the crystallizability of PBF was much better significantly and PETF-18, PPTF-18,of asCBDO, well as the PBTF-18 might be completely amorphous

Summary

Introduction

Due to diminishing crude oil reserves and worsening environmental pollution, more and more attention has been paid to the synthesis of polymers derived from renewable resources to replace the petroleum-based ones. Their thermal or mechanical properties are still subject to improvement when compared with the petroleum-based engineering plastics like poly(ethylene terephthalate) (PET) and polycarbonate (PC) [1,2,3]. 2,5-furandicarboxylic acid (FDCA) is exactly the promising bio-based platform chemical, which can be derived from cellulose or hemicellulose. Due to the difficulty of obtaining FDCA with high purity and its unacceptable

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Conclusion