Carbohydrate-synthetic polymer blends

Market Restrictions. To evaluate the viability of commercializing carbohydrate/synthetic polymer blends, an understanding of the three laws of industrial polymer science must be appreciated. Any academic would find these laws, relative to the three laws of thermodynamics, repulsive anyone with greater than five years of industrial experience knows their utility well. The three laws of industrial polymer science are ... 

Blending of the lowest price commodity polymers from synthetic and carbohydrate polymer families [e.g., poly(ethylene) and starch] would appear to follow these laws. Although each polymer class is produced in large volume (first law), the production rate for com starch/synthetic polymer blends is much lower than that for the synthetic polymer this slower extrusion rate directly affects the final cost. Ignoring this limitation, the film properties of the blend are significantly poorer than those of the synthetic polymer film. Both deficiencies are related to the poor thermoplastic properties of water-soluble polymers such as cora-starch. 

---