Open Access

ARTICLE

Chemical Modification of Cassava Starch by Transesterification Using Vegetable Oil/Aluminum Chloride

A.G. Gouater Issola¹, A. Ngueteu Kamlo², A.M. Cheumani Yona^1,*, M. Kor Ndikontar¹

1 Macromolecular Research Team, Faculty of Science, University of Yaoundé 1, P.O. 812, Yaoundé, Cameroon
2 Department of Chemistry, École Normale Supérieure, University of Yaoundé 1, P.O. Box 47 Yaoundé, Cameroon

*Corresponding author:

Journal of Renewable Materials 2018, 6(6), 642-650. https://doi.org/10.7569/JRM.2018.634108

Abstract

Chemical modification of cassava starch by transesterification of a vegetable oil (palm kernel oil) using aluminum chloride as a Lewis acid catalyst was achieved under relatively mild conditions (temperature 60–110 °C; atmospheric pressure). The reaction was carried out without any additional solvent. The modified starch was characterized by degree of substitution (DS), FTIR, X-ray diffraction and thermal analysis. DS of 0.09 to 0.53 were obtained. The cassava starch presented an X-ray diffraction pattern of a type A starch. X-ray analyses showed that the reaction did not significantly affect the crystallinity of starch. The modified starch films (MStF) adsorbed less water than the reference native starch film (NStF) at all the relative humidities investigated. The MStF were also less soluble in water. The tensile tests showed an increase of the strength and a decrease of the flexibility of MStF compared to the reference NStF. The results showed that this chemical route could be used to increase the water resistance of starch-based materials.

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