Water vapor transport properties of bio-based multilayer materials determined by original and complementary methods

To enhance PLA gas barrier properties, multilayer designs with highly polar barrier layers, such as nanocelluloses, have shown promising results. However, the properties of these polar layers change with humidity. As a result, we investigated water transport phenomena in PLA films coated with nanometric layers of chitosan and nanocelluloses, utilizing a combination of techniques including dynamic vapor sorption (DVS) and long-term water vapor adsorption–diffusion experiments (back-face measurements) to understand the influence of each layer on the behavior of multilayer films. Surprisingly, nanometric coatings impacted PLA water vapor transport. Chitosan/nanocelluloses layers, representing less than 1 wt.% of the multilayer film, increased the water vapor uptake of the film by 14.6%. The nanometric chitosan coating appeared to have localized effects on PLA structure. Moreover, nanocelluloses coatings displayed varying impacts on sample properties depending on their interactions (hydrogen, ionic bonds) with chitosan. The negatively charged CNF TEMPO coating formed a dense network that demonstrated higher resistance to water sorption and diffusion compared to CNF and CNC coatings. This work also highlights the limitations of conventional water vapor permeability measurements, especially when dealing with materials containing ultrathin nanocelluloses layers. It shows the necessity of considering the synergistic effects between layers to accurately evaluate the transport properties.