Showing papers in "European Polymer Journal in 2014"

TL;DR: The advancement of nanocellulose-based biomedical materials is summarized and discussed on the analysis of latest studies (especially reports from the past five years) and focused topics for nano cellulose in biomedicine research in this article are discussed.

TL;DR: In this article, the history of bitumen polymer modification for road construction has been reviewed in the field of road construction during the last 40 years and the challenges and advances in the last decade.

TL;DR: In this article, a terpene d -limonene (LIM) was used to increase PLA crystallinity and to obtain flexible films intended for food packaging applications, and structural and surfaces properties were evaluated.

TL;DR: In this article, a mixture of nanofibrillated cellulose (NFC), polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and borax was incorporated to alter the non-Newtonian behaviour and flow properties of the PVA-borax crosslinked system.

TL;DR: In this article, the effect of polymer architecture on the intrinsic healing character of polymeric materials using different reversible chemistries has been investigated and highlighted the need for more studies on this particular topic.

TL;DR: An overview of the strategies used to enhance chitosan hemocompatibility is provided, focusing on two specific topics: (i) strategies based on chemical modifications of chitOSan and (ii) Strategies based on association of this biopolymer with compounds that exhibit complementary properties.

TL;DR: This review synthetizes the state of the art on this domain, but also deals with the assessment of chitosan environmental impact.

TL;DR: In this paper, a deep characterization of the composites in order to evaluate their behavior regarding neat epoxy resin was performed, and it was confirmed that the GNP addition induces an important stiffing of thermosetting resin and the rest of mechanical properties, strength and elongation, are diminished due to a weak interface formed between the epoxy matrix and nonfunctionalized GNPs.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors highlight the presence of long chain branching, LCB, due to the incorporation of a multifunctional epoxide, named Joncryl ®, as a chain extender, into both poly (lactic acid) (PLA) and poly (butylene-adipate-co-terephtalate) (PBAT) polymers.

TL;DR: In this article, the main focus is on the substitution with dialkylamino hydroxypropyl and trialkylammonium hydroxy propyl ethers, being that the most common modifications involve the introduction of the 2-hydroxy-3-(trimethylammium)propyl group by reaction of the polysaccharide with 2,3-epoxypropyl trimethyammonium chloride in an alkaline solution, and an alternative to this method involves generation of the reagent in situ from 3-chloro-2-hydrox

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors investigated the effect of epoxidized natural rubber (ENR) as a compatibilizer for a silica-reinforced NR tire tread compound.

TL;DR: In this article, a twin-screw microextruder was used to extract cellulose nanocrystals from agro-waste, such as Phormium tenax leaves, and the results showed that the presence of both plasticizer and CNC can alter the degradation rate of developed PLA-based formulations.

TL;DR: In this article, the surface energy of polylactic acid (PLA) for further adhesion uses has been improved with the application of an atmospheric plasma surface treatment, which provides good adhesion properties with the optimization of the process parameters in terms of the nozzle-substrate distance and sample advance rate.

TL;DR: In this article, a correlation between molar mass and strain at break during polylactide degradation has been established: PLA displays a brittle behavior when Mn falls below 40 kg−1 in agreement with relationships linking the critical value for embrittlement with the molar masses between entanglements.

TL;DR: In this paper, the nucleation efficiency of multiwall carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) in poly(e-caprolactone) (PCL) was tested for a wide range of temperatures and cooling rates and compared to the efficiency of homogeneously formed nuclei.

TL;DR: In this article, a special network visualization technique based on Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) was used to gain insight into the silica and rubber interaction in silica-reinforced natural rubber.

TL;DR: In an attempt to expand the range of engineering polymers used for laser sintering, the authors examined the morphology, flowability and interparticle interactions of two commercially available Poly (ether ether) ketone (PEEK) powders, not yet optimised for the LS process, by comparison with the LS optimised Polyamide (PA) and Polyetherketone (PEK) powdered polymers.

TL;DR: In this article, the role of secondary amine in polyhydroxyurethanes (PHUs) synthesis was inspected, and the optimal carbonate-amine ratio was determined from the differential scanning calorimeter results.

TL;DR: In this article, high permittivity polyimide/carbon nanotubes (PI/MWCNTs) nanocomposites with good mechanical flexibility were prepared by electrospinning and hot-pressing.

TL;DR: In this article, the commercial organic-modified clay was incorporated into a nearly amorphous PLA matrix using a melt-blending process to form PLA/clay nanocomposites.

TL;DR: In this paper, the paraffin crystallization peaks for the PE/paraffin blends were observed, with the enthalpy of one peak increasing at the expense of the other.

TL;DR: In this paper, the structure and properties of the graphene before and after polymerization were investigated, alongside the properties of composites, using atomic force microscopy (AFM), Fourier transform infra-red spectroscopy (FTIR), Raman spectrograms, X-ray diffraction (XRD), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC).

TL;DR: Stabilization of PVA/chitosan nanofibres have been investigated in this paper, where three stabilization treatments were adopted; methanol, thermal, and glutaraldehyde.

TL;DR: In this article, the authors reported synthesis of new cyclic carbonate (CC) from cashew nut shell liquid (CNSL) derivative as precursor for NIPU synthesis, which can serve as component for coating formulation and the coating properties can be enhanced by selection of appropriate amine crosslinker.

TL;DR: In this article, the curing kinetics of epoxy nanocomposites prepared by incorporating pristine graphene oxide and hexamethylene diamine functionalized graphene oxide (AGO) was studied using non-isothermal differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) experiments.

TL;DR: In this article, a mathematical approach for the best way to structure hyperelastic models applicable to incompressible rubber-like materials is presented, and a model validation procedure using a step-by-step method for parameters estimation is described.

TL;DR: Preparing self-healing PDMA hydrogels by micellar copolymerization of N,N-dimethylacrylamide with 2 mol% stearyl methacrylate in aqueous sodium dodecyl sulfate–NaCl solutions shows a significant hysteresis and perfect superposition of the successive loading curves demonstrating damage done during loading is recoverable in nature.

TL;DR: Graphene nanoplatelets/epoxy nanocomposites were prepared using a high shear toroidal mixer as dispersion technique, and several graphene nanoplatelet, with different thickness and lateral dimensions, were added in order to analyze the influence of these parameters in the final properties as discussed by the authors.

TL;DR: Nisin enriched HA exhibited a great antimicrobial property on the three tested bacterial species and was of great interest to avoid bacterial contamination in various applications as wound dressings, contacts lenses, cleaning solutions for contact lenses, cosmetics formulations, etc.

TL;DR: In this article, the benefits of the main polymerization processes in supercritical carbon dioxide (scCO 2 ) including homogeneous, precipitation, dispersion, suspension and emulsion systems are discussed.