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Abstract
A chemical/spectrophotometric procedure has been developed that allows the determination of starch and some modified starches (as glucosyl residues) in polyethylene films and pellets. The method uses samples containing up to 60 mg polyethylene and determines the anhydrous starch content of samples possessing starch loads in the range typically encountered with degradable plastics (5–40%). The method consists of dissolution of the polyethylene component into decahydronapthalene (decalin) at 150[ddot]C followed by solubilization with partial hydrolysis of the starch component in 1M HCl at 100[ddot]C. An aliquot of the resulting starch hydrolyzate is analyzed for total carbohydrate using the phenol-sulfuric acid method. The method has been tested on two sets of specially prepared starch-polyethylene films as well as on several commercial products.