Development and evaluation study of polyvinyl alcohol with gluten film

Abstract

Plastic being a non-degradable product paves a way for soil pollution on disposal and disrupts the environment condition. And so there is a need to look for an alternate material instead of plastics to reduce its usage in the regular life of people. To reduce the non-degradability of plastic, bio polymer employments of lipids, proteins, and polysaccharides have been resolute in plastics. In this research work, we have incorporated wheat gluten protein with PVA polymer along with citric acid as a cross linker in order to improve the mechanical and biodegradable property. The polymer film prepared by solvent cast method was treated with UV rays for case one and without UV rays for the second case. The result showed tensile strength of PVA, and UV treated PVA-gluten to be 32 N/mm 2 and 41 N/mm 2 respectively. PVA-gluten UV treated film was degraded within 20 days, whereas the pure PVA polymer undergo degradation in 32 days. From the result, it shows that the addition of gluten into PVA polymer improve the mechanical and biodegradable property and it could be a better alternative for eco-friendly packaging.