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(plastemart) -- Making corn-derived
plastics more heat-tolerant is one of several top-priority targets of
collaborative research at the Agricultural Research Service's Western Regional
Research Center in Albany, California. This will help broaden the range of
applications for which corn-based plastics would find application. Orts and
Lapol co-investigators are doing the work at ARS where Orts leads the Bioproduct
Chemistry and Engineering Research Unit. ARS is USDA's principal intramural
scientific research agency.
The Albany team is developing a product known as a heat-deflection
temperature modifier that would be blended with PLA to make it more
heat-tolerant. The modifier is more than 90% corn-based and is fully
biodegradable. There currently are no commercially available heat-deflection
temperature modifiers for PLA. Preliminary tests at the Albany lab indicate
that, when blended with PLA, the modifier can raise PLA's heat-deflection
temperature by at least 50°F.
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