Nanocellulose interface enhanced all-cellulose foam with controllable strength via a facile liquid phase exchange route

Longfei Sun; Lin Liu; Mingbang Wu; Dengfeng Wang; Rongsheng Shen; Hanfei Zhao; Jing Lu; Juming Yao

doi:10.1016/j.carbpol.2022.120192

Nanocellulose interface enhanced all-cellulose foam with controllable strength via a facile liquid phase exchange route

Carbohydr Polym. 2023 Jan 1:299:120192. doi: 10.1016/j.carbpol.2022.120192. Epub 2022 Oct 11.

Authors

Longfei Sun¹, Lin Liu², Mingbang Wu³, Dengfeng Wang³, Rongsheng Shen³, Hanfei Zhao¹, Jing Lu³, Juming Yao⁴

Affiliations

¹ School of Materials Science and Engineering, Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Hangzhou 310018, China; Zhejiang Provincial Innovation Center of Advanced Textile Technology, Shaoxing 312000, China.
² School of Materials Science and Engineering, Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Hangzhou 310018, China; Zhejiang Provincial Innovation Center of Advanced Textile Technology, Shaoxing 312000, China. Electronic address: linliu@zstu.edu.cn.
³ School of Materials Science and Engineering, Zhejiang Sci-Tech University, Hangzhou 310018, China.
⁴ School of Materials Science and Chemical Engineering, Ningbo University, 818 Fenghua Road, Ningbo 315211, China. Electronic address: yaoj@zstu.edu.cn.

PMID: 36876806
DOI: 10.1016/j.carbpol.2022.120192

Abstract

The development of sustainable, biodegradable, non-toxic biomass foams with outstanding physical properties to replace traditional petroleum-based foams is urgent. In this work, we proposed a simple, efficient, and scalable approach to fabricate nanocellulose (NC) interface enhanced all-cellulose foam through ethanol liquid phase exchange and subsequent ambient drying. In this process, NCs served as reinforcer and binder were integrated with pulp fiber to improve cellulose interfibrillar bonding and interface adhesion between NCs and pulp microfibrils. The resultant all-cellulose foam displayed stable microcellular structure (porosity of 91.7-94.5 %), low apparent density (0.08-0.12 g/cm³), and high compression modulus (0.49-2.96 MPa) by regulating the content and size of NCs. Further, the strengthening mechanism of the structure and property of all-cellulose foam were investigated in detail. This proposed process enabled ambient drying, and is simple and feasible for low-cost, practicable, and scalable production of biodegradable, green bio-based foam without special apparatuses and other chemicals.

Keywords: All-cellulose foam; Ambient drying; Bamboo pulp; Ethanol liquid phase exchange; Lightweight; Nanocelluloses.