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Melissa Camacho¹, Yendry Regina Corrales Ureña^*,1, Mary Lopretti², Leonel Bustamante Carballo¹, Galia Moreno¹, Brian Alfaro¹, Jose Roberto Vega Baudrit^1,3
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 271-279, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634117
Abstract Pineapple peel biomass was used as raw material for nanocellulose extraction. The raw material is a residue from the Costa Rican fruit industry. The nanocellulose was obtained by a two-step hydrolysis process. Firstly, the cellulose was hydrolyzed with HCl to obtain microcrystalline cellulose. In the second step, the hydrolysis was carried out using H2SO4 to obtain smaller fragments and decrease the lignin content. A timedependent study was carried out to determine the particle size decrease depending on the contact time with the H2SO4. The chemical, thermal and morphological properties were analyzed by Fourier transform infrared More >

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Shegufta Shetranjiwalla, Shaojun Li, Laziz Bouzidi, Suresh S. Narine^*
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 333-344, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634102
Abstract The impact of polymerization protocol on phase structure and properties of entirely lipid-derived thermoplastic poly(ester urethane)s (TPEU)s was investigated. The TPEUs were synthesized from 1,7-heptamethylene diisocyanate, polyester diols and 1,9-nonanediol (ND) as chain extender. A two-stage polymerization method was used to prepare two TPEUs; one in which ND was added in the first stage of polymerization as part of the prepolymer and another in the second stage after the prepolymer was formed. Two very different morphologies exhibiting different degrees of phase separation were obtained, driven by the sequence of addition of the chain extender. The More >

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G. Mondragon, C. Peña-Rodriguez, A. Eceiza, A. Arbelaiz^*
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 345-356, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634124
Abstract In this work, the main chemical reactions conditions of a succession of specific chemical treatments used for the isolation of nanocellulose from sisal fibers were evaluated. The novelty of this work is the study done to analyze the effect of different reaction conditions (time or concentration) in fiber structure and composition as well as in the characteristics of obtained cellulosic samples. In order to achieve this goal different physicochemical, thermal and morphological characterization techniques were used after each chemical treatment and the most suitable reaction conditions were selected for the subsequent treatment. Moreover, the thermal More >

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E. M. Ciannamea, D. C. Marin, R. A. Ruseckaite, P. M. Stefani^*
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 357-362, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634125
Abstract In the development of materials based on renewable resources, the search for lignocellulosic substitutes for wood is one of the biggest challenges that academia and the particleboard and wood industries are facing. In this article, particleboards were processed using rice husk, an agricultural waste, as a substitute for wood. Rice husk without any further treatment was processed into particleboards using phenol-formaldehyde resin as binder. The effect of the processing parameters, pressure and binder content (BC) on the density, water absorption (WA), thickness swelling (TS), modulus of rupture (MOR) and modulus of elasticity (MOE) was analyzed. More >

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M. Purushothaman^†,1, P. Santhana Gopala Krishnan^1,2*, S. K. Nayak^1,2
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 363-370, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634128
Abstract In the present work, the hydrophilicity and thermal behavior of nanocomposites of poly(butyl lactate methacrylate) were investigated using different weight percent of sepiolite. These nanocomposites were prepared by solution casting method. X-ray diffraction (XRD) studies indicated that the increase in sepiolite content decreased the average molecular interchain spacing () values from 7.18 to 6.23 Å in nanocomposites. Apart from the amorphous halo peak of nanocomposites, the appearance of crystalline peak at 7.41° was due to the d110 plane of sepiolite. Surface morphology of nanocomposites was studied using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy More >

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Arun Kumar Pradhan^1,2*, Prafulla Kumar Sahoo¹, Pradeep Kumar Rana²
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 371-379, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634129
Abstract Chitosan grafted with poly(methyl-methacrylate) (PMMA) and adsorbed with kaolin functionalized as bioadhesive was prepared via emulsion polymerization technique and physiochemically characterized as a bone-graft substitute. The so prepared grafted bioactive bone cement (BBC) bionanocomposites (BNCs), chitosan-g-PMMA/kaolin, was characterized by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis, field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). The water uptake, retention ability and the nanosize particle arrangement in the polymeric BBC-BNCs were studied along with the mechanical and biodegradation properties. These preliminary investigations of the BNCs will open the door for their use in bioadhesive More >

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N. A. Sri Aprilia¹, M. S. Nurul Atiqah², Zhari Ismail³, C. Y. Loo², Chaturbhuj K. Saurabh², Rudi Dungani⁴, Abdul Khalil H.P.S^2*
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 380-387, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634130
Abstract Due to environmental concerns, green composites have become a highly researched material. In the present study, kenaf fiber was used as reinforcement in epoxy-based composite with weight fraction ranges from 0, 5, 10, and 15% (w/w of resin). The ratio of epoxy to hardener was 65:32.5. Prior to incorporation, kenaf bast fiber underwent Soda-AQ pulping followed by total chlorine-free bleaching (OAZP sequence). The obtained pulp was then subjected to supercritical carbon dioxide extraction (SCE) treatment. It was observed that epoxy composite with 10% of fiber loading demonstrated the highest mechanical properties with a tensile strength More >

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F. J. Santiago-Medina¹, A. Pizzi^{1, 2*}, M. C. Basso¹, L. Delmotte³, S. Abdalla²
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 388-399, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634142
Abstract The reaction of a desulphurized kraft lignin with hexamethylene diamine as a model of a polyamine has been investigated. For this purpose, guaiacol was also used as a lignin model compound and treated under similar conditions. Solid state CP-MAS 13C NMR, FTIR and MALDI-TOF spectroscopy studies revealed that polycondensation compounds leading to resins were obtained by the reaction of the amines with the phenolic and aliphatic hydroxy groups of lignin. Simultaneously a second reaction leading to the formation of ionic bonds between the same groups occurred. These new reactions have been clearly shown to involve More >

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Poonam Trivedi¹, Jens Schaller², Jan Gustafsson¹, Pedro Fardim^1,3*
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 400-409, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634143
Abstract In the present study, we report the supramolecular design of cellulose-sulfonate hydrogel beads by blending water soluble sodium cellulose ethyl sulfonate (CES) with the pretreated cellulose in sodium hydroxide-ureawater solvent system at −6 °C followed by coagulation in the 2M sulfuric acid system. The increasing of CES amount from 10% to 90% had a substantial effect on the viscosity and storage (G′) and loss (G″) moduli of the blended solutions. The CES concentration up to 50% in blends led to the formation of physically stable hydrogels after coagulation in acidic medium at pH-1 and showed… More >

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Liqing Wei¹, Shupin Luo², Armando G. McDonald², Umesh P. Agarwal¹, Kolby C. Hirth¹, Laurent M. Matuana³, Ronald C. Sabo^1* , Nicole M. Stark^1*
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 410-422, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634144
Abstract Cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) are renewable and sustainable filler for polymeric nanocomposites. However, their high hydrophilicity limits their use with hydrophobic polymer for composite materials. In this study, freeze-dried CNCs were modified by transesterification with canola oil fatty acid methyl ester to reduce the hydrophilicity. The transesterified CNCs (CNCFE) were compounded with PLA into nanocomposites. CNCFE with long-chain hydrocarbons plays a role as plasticizer. Increasing CNCFE loadings resulted in clear plasticizing effects. Lower Tg and Tm were achieved for CNCFE-based nanocomposites. Plasticizing nanocomposite melt with CNCFE can mitigate the degradation of CNCs during thermal processing. The More >

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Weijun Yang^1†, Xiaomin Zhao^2†, Elena Fortunati¹, Franco Dominici¹, Jose M. Kenny¹, Debora Puglia^1*, De-Yi Wang^2*
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 423-434, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634146
Abstract Presented herein is a deep investigation of the fire, mechanical and thermal performances of poly(lactic acid) (PLA)-based nanocomposites, which were obtained by combining cellulose nanocrystals (CNC) with various contents of N,N’-diallyl-phenylphosphoricdiamide (P-AA) via a two-steps masterbatch melt extrusion process (glycidyl methacrylate grafting on PLA and CNC premixing with PLA). Results have shown that the value of the limiting oxygen index (LOI) increased to 28.8% and a V-0 rating in UL94 test was obtained when 2 wt% of P-AA was added in the presence of cellulose nanocrystals (3 wt%). The incorporation of CNC induced a decrease More >

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F.-J. Santiago-Medina¹, A. Pizzi^1,2,*, S. Abdalla²
Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.5, No.5, pp. 435-447, 2017, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634166
Abstract An adhesive based on the reaction of a very fast reacting procyanidin-type condensed tannin, namely purified pine bark tannin, with a biosourced nontoxic and nonvolatile aldehyde derived from the pulp and paper industry, namely hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF), was shown to almost satisfy the relevant standards for bonding wood particleboard. The conditions of pH used are determinant for the result. The oligomers obtained by the reaction and their distribution have been determined by matrix-assisted laser ionization desorption time-of-flight (MALDI-TOF) mass spectrometry. Of the two reactive groups of hydroxymethylfurfural capable of reacting, the furanic aldehyde one and the More >

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