Cooperativity Scaling and Free Volume in Plasticized Polylactide

The authors would like to thank the region Haute Normandie for their financial support and the acquisition of the Broadband Dielectric Spectrometer. R.G. acknowledges U.S. National Science Foundation (Grant no. DMR-1725188) for the acquisition of PAL spectrometer. The experimental evidence of the increase of activation energy associated with the super Arrhenius behavior governing amorphous polylactide by free volume variations has been obtained through a combination of calorimetric, dielectric, and positron annihilation lifetime measurements. The amount of free volume in polylactide was controlled by the amount of acetyltributylcitrate plasticizer in the composition. Plasticization is shown…