Effect of wood flour on structural and thermal properties and antibacterial activity of PLA filled with triclosan

摘要

Poly(lactic acid) (PLA) were compounded with wood flour and triclosan. The wood/PLA composites were then characterized using differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) and the antibacterial activity was also assessed via plate count agar (PCA) under a wide range of contact times using Escherichia coli (E.coli) as the testing bacteria. The characterization results suggested that the addition of wood flour produced two melting peaks behaviour which resulted in an enlargement of degree of crystallinity (X_c) in the wood/PLA composites. These two metling peaks were probably related with re-crystallization of the PLA by the presence of wood. The antibacterial efficiency of triclosan/PLA was improved considerably by the presence of wood flour, suggesting that the wood particles could act as "anti-bacterial promoter" for the PLA.