A novel synthetic approach to stereo-block poly(lactic acid)

Stereoblock poly(lactic acid) (sb-PLA), consisting of poly(L-lactic acid) (PLLA) and poly(D-lactic acid) (PDLA) in a blocky sequence, can successfully be synthesized by solid-state polycondensation of a stereocomplexed mixture of PLLA and PDLA. First, the melt polycondensation of L- and D-lactic acids is conducted to obtain PLLA and PDLA with medium molecular weights. Then, both polymers are melt-blended to easily form the stereocomplex. The resulting stereocomplexed mixture (melt-blend) is subjected to solid-state polycondensation for chain extension. The molecular weight (M-w) of the resultant sb-PLA is strongly affected by the lactide/oligomer content in the melt-blend, which is determined by the melt-blending conditions, because it is directly correlated with the polymer crystallinity of the polycondensation products.