Physicochemical characterization of nylon fiber reinforced chitosan composites

摘要

Chemical modification that lead to the formation of chitosan derivatives, the grafted chitosan and chitosan composites have gained much attention which was extensively studied and widely reported in the literature. Nowadays the development of natural fiber reinforced composites is the main attraction of research community because they are turning out to be an alternative solution to the ever depleting petroleum sources. In the present work nylon fiber is used as reinforcement. The ternary composites were prepared by mixing the chitosan, carboxy methyl starch and nylon fiber in 1:2:1 ratio with and without the cross linking agent like glutaraldehyde using solution casting method. The physicochemical characterization of prepared ternary composite samples have been studied by means of Fourier transform infra red spectroscopy (FT-IR), Thermo gravimetric analysis (TGA), Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) studies. The FT-IR results indicate the presence of cross linking between the chitosan, carboxy methyl starch and nylon fiber with the cross linking agent glutaraldehyde. The XRD studies were mainly carried out to find out the change in crystallinity of ternary composites of chitosan prepared with and without the cross linking agent glutaraldehyde. The enhancement in thermal properties of polymer composites prepared in the presence of cross linking agent glutaraldehyde was also identified by TGA experiment and the results were investigated