Turning Up Heat on Corn-Based Plastics

ARS finds product that can act as heat deflector.

Compiled by staff

Published: Sep 2, 2010

Your favorite catsup or fruit juice might be "hot-filled" at the food-processing plant - that is, poured into its waiting container while the catsup or juice is still hot from pasteurization. Current containers made from corn-based plastics literally can't take the heat of hot-filling. But, Agricultural Research Service scientists may have found an answer to this problem.

According to USDA chemist William Orts and a team of collaborators from Lapol, LLC, of Santa Barbara, California, corn-based plastics are made by fermenting corn sugar to produce lactic acid. The lactic acid is used to form polylactic acid, or PLA, a bioplastic. The research 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. By boosting the bioplastics' heat tolerance, the collaboration, under way since 2007, may broaden the range of applications for which corn-derived plastics could be used as an alternative to petroleum-based plastics.

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That is wonderful. I remember the USDA ARS Lab in Peoria working on something like that years ago! Good work!
Posted by Midwest Gal on September 2 at 7:16 AM