Simultaneous improvements of thermal stability and mechanical properties of poly(propylene carbonate) via incorporation of environmental-friendly polydopamine

Inspired by the photoprotection, radical scavenging of melanin together with versatile adhesive ability of mussel proteins, polydopamine (PDA) nanoparticles were successfully prepared and incorporated into environmentally friendly polymer, poly(propylene carbonate) (PPC) via solvent blending. The prepared composites exhibited excellent thermal stability in air and nitrogen atmosphere and extraordinary mechanical properties. The composites displayed eminent increase of temperature at 5% weight loss (T 5%) by 30–100 K with 0.3 wt%–2.0 wt% loadings, meanwhile, the tensile strength and Young’s modulus were significantly improved from 11.5 MPa and 553.7 MPa to 40.5 MPa and 2411.2 MPa, respectively. The kinetic calculation indicated that improvement of T 5% is presumably derived from suppressing chain-end unzipping. The glass transition temperature (T g) of the PPC/PDA composites increased by 8–10 K. This is probably due to hydrogen bonding interaction since the abundant proton donors along PDA chains would interact with proton acceptors like C=O and C-O-C in PPC which would cause restriction of segmental motion of PPC chains.