Verónica L. Mucci¹, M. E. Victoria Hormaiztegui², Mirta I. Aranguren^1,*

Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.8, No.6, pp. 579-601, 2020, DOI:10.32604/jrm.2020.09455 - 12 May 2020

Abstract The increasing pressure from consumers and policy makers to reduce the use of synthetic polymers, whose production contributes to the depletion of non-renewable resources and are usually non- biodegradable, has prompted the efforts to find suitable bio-based sources for the production of polymers. Vegetable oils have been a frequently spotted in this search because they are versatile, highly available and a low cost liquid biosource, which can be used in the synthesis of a wide plethora of different polymers and reactive monomers. Following the same idea of reducing the environmental stress, the traditional polyurethanes that… More >

Silvia Helena Fuentes da Silva¹, Patricia Soares Bilhalva dos Santos², Darci Alberto Gatto³, Maria Angeles Andres¹, Itziar Egüés^1,*

Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.7, No.6, pp. 527-534, 2019, DOI:10.32604/jrm.2019.04291

Abstract Kraft lignin was liquefied using polyethylene glycol #400 (PEG) and glycerol (G) in a weight ratio of 80/20 (w/w) and sulphuric acid (SA) as catalyst under atmospheric pressure at 160ºC. The three independent variables: reaction time (60, 80 and 100 min), percentage of lignin (15, 20 and 25%, w/w), and catalyst concentration (0, 3 and 6%, w/w), were varied resulting in 27 experimental runs. The effect of these reaction conditions on the properties of the polyols was evaluated. The statistical analysis showed that only “the percentage of lignin” did not influence the properties of the More >

S. Michałowski¹, M. A. Mosiewicki^2*, M. Kuran´ska¹, M. I. Aranguren², A. Prociak¹

Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.6, No.4, pp. 426-437, 2018, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2017.634163

Abstract Elastomeric polyurethanes were prepared from a reference polyurethane system modified with biobased polyols synthesized using rapeseed or palm oils. The reference material was modified by replacement of the commercial polyol by 10% of biopolyols and also by addition of sisal fibers up to 5 wt%. The higher functionality of the biopolyols increased the crosslinking density of the networks and this was reflected by an increase in hardness and a decrease in water absorption. The effect of the sisal fibers mainly improved the mechanical and thermomechanical properties of the system with rapeseed oil because of good More >