Uniformly Dispersed Poly(ethylene glycol) Functionalized Graphene Oxide/Poly(L-lactic acid) Nanocomposites with Balanced Mechanical Properties

Abstract

Balanced mechanical properties are always the goal of high-performance general plastics for engineering purposes. In order to develop uniformly dispersed graphene oxide/poly(L-lactic acid) nanocomposites with balanced mechanical properties, a poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) grafted graphene oxide was introduced into poly(L-lactic acid) (PLLA) matrix. The PEG grafted graphene oxide (GEG) was confirmed by the results of fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectra and thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA). Then the mechanical properties of the nanohybrids were measured. The results showed that in contrast to the aggregation of GO, GEG could uniformly disperse in PLLA matrix. An intriguing phenomenon is that thanks to the strong interfacial interaction between GEG and PLLA, it exhibits a substantial enhancement of the elongation at break (EB) as well as a simultaneous improvement of the tensile strength (TS), while the addition of GO decreases the EB of PLLA matrix. This work provides a potential industrialized technique for high-performance PLLA nanocomposites