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. 2024 Mar 26;14(1):7172.
doi: 10.1038/s41598-024-56534-z.

Biodegradable poly(ethylene glycol-glycerol-itaconate-sebacate) copolyester elastomer with significantly reinforced mechanical properties by in-situ construction of bacterial cellulose interpenetrating network

Lisheng Tang #  1   2 , Yuanyuan Jin #  1 , Xiaoyan He  3 , Ran Huang  4   5
Affiliations

Biodegradable poly(ethylene glycol-glycerol-itaconate-sebacate) copolyester elastomer with significantly reinforced mechanical properties by in-situ construction of bacterial cellulose interpenetrating network

Lisheng Tang et al. Sci Rep. .

Abstract

To address the concern that biodegradable elastomers are environmental-friendly but usually associated with poor properties for practical utilization, we report a star-crosslinked poly(ethylene glycol-glycerol-itaconate-sebacate) (PEGIS) elastomer synthesized by esterification, polycondensation and UV curing, and reinforced by bacterial cellulose (BC). The interpenetrating network of primary BC backbone and vulcanized elastomer is achieved by the "in-situ secondary network construction" strategy. With the well dispersion of BC without agglomeration, the mechanical properties of PEGIS are significantly enhanced in tensile strength, Young's modulus and elongation at break. The reinforcement strategy is demonstrated to be efficient and offers a route to the development of biodegradable elastomers for a variety of applications in the future.

Keywords: Bacterial cellulose; Biodegradable; Copolyester elastomer; Interpenetrating network; PEGIS.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
The scheme of “in-situ secondary network construction”.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Comparison of the mechanical properties of the elastomer prepared in this work with similar elastomers reported in previous literature (Refs.,,–).
Figure 3
Figure 3
1H NMR spectrum of pre-PEGIS.
Figure 4
Figure 4
FTIR spectrum of pre-PEGIS.
Figure 5
Figure 5
FTIR spectrum of pre-PEGIS, pre-PEGIS/BC5, pre-PEGIS/BC10, and pre-PEGIS/BC15.
Figure 6
Figure 6
Rheological behaviors of pre-PEGIS and pre-PEGIS/BC: black line represents the storage modulus and red line represents loss modulus; (a) the summary of storage modulus of all four types of samples; (b) the summary of loss modulus; and (c–f) respectively show the rheological behaviors of pre-PEGIS, pre-PEGIS/BC5, pre-PEGIS/BC10 and pre-PEGIS/BC15.
Figure 7
Figure 7
FTIR spectrums of pre-PEGIS and PEGIS before and after ultraviolet curing.
Figure 8
Figure 8
DSC cooling scan (a) and heating scan (b) of PEGIS and PEGIS/BC blends.
Figure 9
Figure 9
Tensile stress–strain curves of PEGIS and PEGIS/BC blends.
Figure 10
Figure 10
SEM image of tensile section of pure polyester PEGIS (a); SEM images of pure BC (b) and BC after being stretched in the tensile section (c); SEM images of tensile section of PEGIS/BC5 (d, g), PEGIS/BC10 (e, h), and PEGIS/BC15 (f, i) with different magnification.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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