Plasticizing performance and biological safety of multi-green-component plasticizers for PVC

The plasticizers include green lactic acid, vanillic acid and n-heptanol. • The interaction between the plasticizers and PVC was demonstrated through molecular simulation. • The BVL7 plasticizer has no adverse effects on embryonic development. Plasticizers are crucial additives for poly (vinyl chloride) (PVC) processing. However, conventional phthalate-based plasticizers suffer from high migration rates and significant toxicity. While sustainable biobased alternatives have been developed, their thermal stability and plasticizing performance remain, in the main, inferior to phthalate-based ones. A multi-component green plasticizer, BVL7, has been synthesized from renewable resources including vanillic acid, lactic acid, and n-heptanol. BVL7 exhibits approximately 30% higher thermal stability than commercial biobased plasticizers, matching that of phthalate-based counterparts. The elongation at break of PVC samples filled with BVL7 increased from 35.9% (unplasticized PVC) to 375.9%. The elongation at break of the BVL7 plasticizing sample is approximately 20% higher than that of commercial biobased plasticizers, and it is comparable to the plasticizing performance of phthalate plasticizers. Molecular docking simulations suggest strong interactions between BVL7 and PVC, confirming the rationality of its molecular design. Owing to these interactions, BVL7 reduces migration in fat simulants by 90% compared with that for phthalate plasticizers, while the blend over 90% of performance after migration. Importantly, BVL7 exhibits safe characteristics for both organisms and the environment. A new strategy for developing novel plasticizers with high performance, low toxicity and a high biobased content has been demonstrated. Download: Download high-res image (291KB) Download: Download full-size image