abstract
All-Cellulose Composites (ACCs) with cellulose derivatives have been neglected in the composite industry due to their high brittleness, low impact strength, and flowability. Epoxidized vegetable oils are well-known plasticizers for several polymers and composites but have never been exploited on the production of ACCs. The present work investigates the potential of an epoxidized linseed oil (ELO) as a cost-effective additive to enhance the properties and processability of ACCs made with cellulose acetate butyrate (CAB) and micronized Eucalyptus pulp fibers. The thermo-mechanical characterization of the composites, obtained by melt-mixing, revealed that ELO significantly decreases the glass transition temperature (Tg) of the obtained composites without compromising their thermal stability. Moreover, an 84-fold improvement was achieved on the melt flow rate (MFR) with 30 wt% ELO, and growing amounts of this additive caused an augment on the elongation and flexural strains at break. High loads of ELO resulted also on a substantial improvement of the impact strength, with values raising from 5.3 & PLUSMN; 0.9 kJ.m 2 up to 29.5 & PLUSMN; 1.7 kJ.m 2. Furthermore, this eco-friendly plasticizer also led to higher water uptake values, as well as higher biodegradation rates than the non-plasticized ACCs. Therefore, these results evince a remarkable improvement on the ACCs processability, performance, and biodegradation upon addition of a biobased and cost-effective plasticizer.
keywords
REINFORCED POLYMER COMPOSITES; MECHANICAL-BEHAVIOR; BIOCOMPOSITES; BIODEGRADABILITY; NANOCOMPOSITES; MORPHOLOGY; DISPERSION; HYBRIDS
subject category
Agriculture
authors
Valente, BFA; Karamysheva, A; Silvestre, AJD; Neto, CP; Vilela, C; Freire, CSR
our authors
Armando Jorge Domingues Silvestre
Full professor
Bruno Filipe Afonso Valente
PhD Student
Carla Vilela
Assistant Professor
Carmen Sofia da Rocha Freire Barros
Coordinating ResearcherProjects
InPaCTus - Innovative Products and Technologies from Eucalyptus Project (InPacTus)
CICECO - Aveiro Institute of Materials (UIDB/50011/2020)
CICECO - Aveiro Institute of Materials (UIDP/50011/2020)
Associated Laboratory CICECO-Aveiro Institute of Materials (LA/P/0006/2020)
Collaboratory for Emerging Technologies, CoLab (EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES)
acknowledgements
This work was carried out under the Project inpactus - innovative products and technologies from eucalyptus, Project N. degrees 21874 funded by Portugal 2020 through European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) in the frame of COMPETE 2020 n degrees 246/AXIS II/2017, and project CICECO- Aveiro Institute of Materials, UIDB/50011/2020, UIDP/50011/2020 & LA/P/0006/2020, financed by national funds through FCT/MCTES (PIDDAC) . FCT is also acknowledged for the research contracts under Scientific Employment Stimulus to C.V. (CEECIND/00263/2018 and 2021.01571. CEECIND) and C.S.R.F. (CEECIND/00464/2017) .