Sustainable polymer packaging materials based on ternary polymer blends with high barrier

高阻隔塑料包装是塑料包装市场特别是食品包装行业的重要组成部分。保护食品免受环境因素，特别是氧气的影响，已被证明可以显着延长保质期并减少食物浪费。高阻隔塑料包装通常是多层聚合物膜，其中高阻隔聚合物材料层夹在其他层之间。 最常见的高阻隔材料是乙烯乙烯醇（EVOH）和聚酰胺（PA）。这些材料相对于商品聚合物如聚乙烯（PE）或聚丙烯（PP）的高成本增加了高阻隔包装的成本。此外，这些材料在聚合物包装结构中的存在使得聚合物包装不可回收。这是由于目前使用的高阻隔聚合物包装的再加工引起加工问题并导致最终性能和外观较差的产品。 该提案的目的是研究一种新型高阻隔多相塑料材料的商业潜力，并将该技术应用于实际的塑料包装产品。所提出的材料是PA、EVOH和PP或PE的三元聚合物共混物。共混物被设计成实现称为完全润湿的形态，其中EVOH作为薄层在PA和另一烯烃相（PE或PP）的两个主要相之间铺展。通过高阻隔性EVOH对低阻隔性烯烃相的包封，显著提高了氧气阻隔性。结果是具有改进的可再循环性的较低成本的聚合物体系，其显示出与纯PA类似的氧气阻隔性能。我们的目标是许可这种材料的成分和加工知识，本项目结束时的总体目标是获得至少两种可能的塑料包装，这些包装具有足够的可行商业潜力，以吸引客户投资。

High barrier plastic packaging is an important component in plastic packaging market especially in the food packaging industry. Protecting food products from environmental elements especially oxygen has been shown to increase significantly the shelf life and reduce food waste. High barrier plastic packaging is commonly a multilayer polymer film in which a layer of high barrier polymer material is sandwiched between other layers. The most common high barrier materials are ethylene vinyl alcohol (EVOH) and polyamide (PA). The high cost of these materials with respect to commodity polymers such as polyethylene (PE) or polypropylene (PP) increases the cost of high barrier packaging. In addition, the presence of these materials in the polymer packaging structure makes the polymer packaging non-recyclable. This is due to the fact that re-processing of currently used high barrier polymer packages causes processing issues and results in products with poor final properties and appearance. The objective of this proposal is to examine the commercial potential of a novel high barrier multiphase plastic material and to apply the technology to actual plastic packaging products. The proposed materials are ternary polymer blends of PA, EVOH and PP or PE. The blends are designed to achieve a morphology known as complete wetting in which EVOH is spread as a thin layer between two major phases of PA and the other olefin phase (PE or PP). The encapsulation of low barrier olefin phase by the high barrier EVOH, increases significantly the oxygen barrier properties. The result is a lower cost polymer system with improved recyclability which shows oxygen barrier properties similar to the neat PA. We aim to license the composition as well as the processing knowledge for this material and the overall objective at the end of this project is to obtain at least two possible plastic packaging that demonstrate sufficient viable commercial potential to attract client investment.