Thermo-Mechanical Properties of Bio-Based Polymers

Bio-based polymers offer a broad range of applications in pharmaceutical engineering. However, their assortment gets constrained owing to variations in structural conformation, which affects the thermomechanical properties during complex formulation. The thermomechanical property of pharmaceutically inactive ingredients provides insight into the thermal expansion, glass transitions temperature, softening point, compositional, and phase changes of biomaterials with different geometries on the application of constant force as a function of temperature. In addition, thermomechanical properties provide fundamental information on network chemical structure, crosslink density, rubbery modulus, failure strain, and toughness. Moreover, the structural composition of polysaccharides also affects the composite’s mechanical properties. Hence, analysis of thermomechanical properties provides valuable information that is applicable in different sectors including aviation, quasistatic loading, electroplating technology, micro-electric, construction, cosmetics, food packaging, and pharmaceutical products. This compilation highlights the basics of thermal and mechanical experiments on bio-based polymers with different fabrication for both technical and pharmaceutical formulations.

Keywords: Bio-based polymers, Differential scanning calorimetric, Differential thermal analysis, Thermogravimetric analysis, Thermomechanical.