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Full-Text Articles in Engineering

Characterization Of Lignin And Cellulose Biopolymers Structure – Function Relationships, Zachariah Pittman May 2023

Characterization Of Lignin And Cellulose Biopolymers Structure – Function Relationships, Zachariah Pittman

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Biomass is vital to ongoing efforts to secure a sustainable future. While many of our efforts focus on finding alternative forms of energy, biomass among them, only biomass has the potential to serve as a sustainable materials feedstock. However, biomass is heterogenous, complicating the upgrading processes needed to manufacture commodity and performance products. For example, plant biomass consists largely of cellulose, a crystalline polysaccharide, and lignin, a highly stable polyaromatic. The specific properties of cellulose and lignin depend greatly on the plant, harvesting conditions, and isolation procedures. Thus, accurate and reliable determination of the fundamental properties of biomass is crucial …


'Fabrication And Characterization Of Polymer Blends And Composites Derived From Biopolymers', Suraj Sharma Dec 2008

'Fabrication And Characterization Of Polymer Blends And Composites Derived From Biopolymers', Suraj Sharma

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This research focuses on fabricating blends and composites from natural polymers especially from proteins and natural epoxy, and describing the properties of plastics made from them. Specifically, plastic samples from partially denatured feathermeal and bloodmeal proteins, derived from the animal co-products (rendering) industry, were successfully produced through a compression molding process. The modulus (stiffness) of the material obtained was found to be comparable with that of commercial synthetic materials, such as polystyrene, but was found to have lower toughness characteristics, which is a common phenomenon among plastics produced from animal and plant proteins. Therefore, this study explored blending methods for …