Polymer Material Polylactic Acid (PLA, PLGA)

PLA application

Polylactic acid (PLA) is a new type of bio-based and renewable biodegradable material, made from renewable plant resources such as cereal husks, wheat stalks and other types of straw, or starchy crops such as corn, sweet potatoes and cassava. Starch raw materials are saccharified to obtain glucose, which is then fermented with glucose and certain strains to produce high-purity lactic acid. Finally, polylactic acid of a certain molecular weight is synthesized through chemical synthesis methods. It has excellent biodegradability. After use, it can be completely degraded by microorganisms in nature under specific conditions, eventually generating carbon dioxide and water, without polluting the environment. This is very beneficial for environmental protection and is recognized as an environmentally friendly material.
The recycling of polylactic acid (polylactic acid) differs from that of other polymers in that waste polylactic acid plastics are collected in special containers and degraded into small-molecule monomers through pyrolysis, hydrolysis and other methods. Then, producers synthesize the monomer lactic acid into polylactic acid raw materials with certain properties and re-enter the market for use.

PLGA

Polylactic acid - glycolic acid

The copolymer PLGA (poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid), polyethylene-lactide) is randomly polymerized from two monomers - lactic acid and glycolic acid. It is a degradable functional high-molecular organic compound with good biocompatibility
It is non-toxic and has excellent bag-forming and film-forming properties, and is widely used in the pharmaceutical, medical engineering materials and modern industrial fields. PLGA has been certified by the FDA in the United States.
It has been officially included in the United States Pharmacopeia as a pharmaceutical excipient
Different monomer ratios can be used to prepare different types of PLGA. For example, PLGA 75:25 indicates that the polymer is composed of 75% lactic acid and 25% glycolic acid. All PLGA are amorphous, with a glass transition temperature ranging from 40 to 60 °C. Pure lactic acid or hydroxyl groups

The application of PLGA

Polylactic acid - glycolic acid (PLGA) has good biocompatibility and biodegradability, and the degradation rate is controllable. It has wide applications in the field of biomedical engineering. It has currently been fabricated into artificial catheters, drug sustained-release carriers, and tissue engineering scaffold materials. The preparation and application of various PLGA drug microspheres have been frequently reported. Among them, PLGA microspheres, as carriers for protein and enzyme drugs, are a research hotspot. It is of great significance to seek a low-cost, simple process for the production of PLGA with no (low) biological toxicity.