Expanded polylactide bead foaming - A new technology

Bead foaming technology with double crystal melting peak structure has been recognized as a promising method to produce low-density foams with complex geometries. During the molding stage of the bead foams, the double peak structure generates a strong bead-to-bead sintering and maintains the overall foam structure. During recent years, polylactide (PLA) bead foaming has been of the great interest of researchers due to its origin from renewable resources and biodegradability. However, due to the PLA's low melt strength and slow crystallization kinetics, the attempts have been limited to the manufacturing methods used for expanded polystyrene. In this study, for the first time, we developed microcellular PLA bead foams with double crystal melting peak structure. Microcellular PLA bead foams were produced with expansion ratios and average cell sizes ranging from 3 to 30-times and 350 nm to 15 μm, respectively. The generated high melting temperature crystals during the saturation significantly affected the expansion ratio and cell density of the PLA bead foams by enhancing the PLA's poor melt strength and promoting heterogeneous cell nucleation around the crystals.