Influence of substrate and temperature on the biodegradation of polyester-based materials: Polylactide and poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyhexanoate) as model cases

[EN] The extended use of polymers from renewable resources such as aliphatic polyesters or polyhydroxyalkanoates boosted the necessity to understand their behaviour in an end-of-life scenario. Although they can be degraded in reasonable shorter times than traditional polymers, understanding the degradation mechanisms under dissimilar conditions will contribute to further developments in this field. This work aimed to study the effect of temperature and substrate in the degradation of polylactide (PLA) and poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyhexanoate) (PHBH) in a simulated laboratory scale to ascertain their contribution, separately or in combination. For this purpose, nine parallel degradat…