Effect of diameter of poly(lactic acid) fiber on the physical properties of poly(ɛ-caprolactone)

Biodegradable polymer composites based on poly(ɛ-caprolactone) (PCL) and poly(lactic acid) (PLA) fibers with diameters of 18, 26, 180 μm were prepared by melt compounding. The PLA fiber content in the composites was constant at 20% by weight. The effects of fibers with different diameters on the physical properties and enzymatic degradation of PCL were investigated. The morphological analysis indicated good interfacial adhesion between PCL and PLA fiber, which was beneficial to improve the physical properties of PCL. With increasing PLA fiber diameter, the complex viscosity and modulus of PCL were significantly increased, especially at low frequencies, indicating that the hindered effect of the fiber on the mobility of the PCL molecular chains was more obvious when PLA fiber diameter was thicker. However, as for the mechanical properties, the reinforcement was more obvious to PCL with the smaller PLA fiber diameter. This was because increasing efficient load transfer may be appeared due to the larger surface area and better interface bonding force of the fiber with thinner diameters. The enzymatic degradation of PCL was accelerated with the addition of large PLA fiber diameter of 26 and 180 μm, and hardly changed with the small PLA fiber diameter of 18 μm.