polymer in processes involving melt stretching (film extrusion, blow molding, foaming, and the like) have been limited due to disadvantages such as intrinsic brittleness, slow crystallization rate, low melt strength, narrow processing window, and low thermal stability. [7][8][9][10][11][12][13] The low melt strength of PLA is due to the inherent degradation behavior of polyesters. PLA degrades at temperatures above its melting point, similar to other polyesters. The degradation reactions include hydrolysis, inter-chain transesterification, and depolymerization by back-biting (intramolecular transesterification). Depending on the process conditions, one of these undesirable reactions overcomes the others. For example, the chain scission, at temperatures above the melting point, is responsible for the degradation of the polymer that leads to a decrease in molecular weight and rheological properties. [1,14,15] To obtain a wider processing window for PLA and thus make the range of its applications broader, improved melt strength is postulated. [16,17] For increasing the melt strength, the modification of PLA is an effective method to achieve a branched high molecular weight structure. Several ways exist for the branching of PLA, including solution polymerization, using the free radical initiator, and functional groups reaction. Due to environmental problems, high costs, low effectiveness, and issues associated with process convenience, solution reactions are not the best choices. Furthermore, as the free radical reaction is a random one, it is more difficult to control the molecular weight when utilizing this method. On the contrary, compared to the free radical branching, reactions of functional groups tend to give rise to long chain branching (LCB) more readily, leading to controlled structures. [18] Chainextension reactions are exploited to increase the melt strength of linear polymers. The advantage of using the chain extenders with functional groups includes re-bonding the degraded chains together and as a result, increasing the molecular weight and the melt strength. For polyesters such as PET and PLA, chain-extension occurs by increasing the molecular weight due to bridging the hydroxyl or carboxyl reactive-end groups using bi-or multi-functional molecules. [1,9] Some researchers have investigated the effect of different chain extenders with different functional groups such as diand multi-functional epoxides, [19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27] diisocyanate, [28][29][30] dianhydride, [31][32][33] and so forth. Among these, chain extenders constituted of multi-functional epoxy groups such as Joncryl are highly This research considers a two-step chain extension reaction in the presence of two chain extenders, Joncryl and Pyromellitic dianhydride (PMDA), as a solution for poor melt properties of poly (lactic acid) (PLA). The aim of adding PMDA is to increase the carboxyl groups via the anhydride ring-opening reaction so that the reaction between PLA and Joncryl could be facilitated since the reactivity between t...