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Preparation of cellulose nanocrystal from tobacco-stem and its application in ethyl cellulose film as a reinforcing agent

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Abstract

The brittleness of ethyl cellulose (EC) film limited its full applications, and the addition of plasticizers is one of the most common methods to reduce its brittleness. However, the mechanical properties are normally dropped with the addition of plasticizers. Herein, cellulose nanocrystal (CNC) was chosen as a reinforcing agent to improve its mechanical properties. CNC was firstly extracted from the tobacco-stem and then modified by epoxidized soybean oil (ESO) via ring-opening grafting to obtain epoxidized soybean oil grafting CNC (ECNC). The grafting effect was evaluated by FTIR and XPS. After that, the films of ECNC/EC nanocomposites were prepared by the solution-casting method, and their mechanical, thermal and optical properties and fracture morphology were investigated. The results showed that at 4 phr loading of ECNC, the tensile strength of the nanocomposite film was up to 43.7 Mpa (about twice as much as that of the EC film plasticized by ESO), and the elongation at break was not influenced. Moreover, a higher thermal decomposition temperature was achieved for the ECNC/EC films. Besides, owing to the good dispersion, ECNC had no significant impact on the transparency, and the films presented high light transmittance in the visible light region.

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Acknowledgments

The work was supported by Natural Science Foundation of Hunan Province of China (No. 2018JJ2088), Scientific Research Foundation of Hunan Provincial Education Department of China (No. 15K034) and Postgraduate Research and Innovation Project of Hunan Province of China (Nos. CX20190839 and CX2018B735).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. National and Local Joint Engineering Research Center of Advanced Packaging Materials Research and Development Technology, Hunan Key Laboratory of Biomass Fiber Functional Materials, Hunan International Scientific and Technological Innovation Cooperation Base of Biomass Fiber Materials and Application, College of Packaging and Materials Engineering, Hunan University of Technology, Zhuzhou, 412007, China

    Junhua Shi & Wenyong Liu

  2. College of Packaging Design and Art, Hunan University of Technology, Zhuzhou, 412007, China

    Junhua Shi, Xinman Jiang & Wenliang Liu

  3. Department of Polymer Materials and Engineering, College of Packaging and Materials Engineering, Hunan University of Technology, Zhuzhou, 412007, China

    Wenyong Liu

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  1. Junhua Shi
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Correspondence to Wenyong Liu.

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Shi, J., Liu, W., Jiang, X. et al. Preparation of cellulose nanocrystal from tobacco-stem and its application in ethyl cellulose film as a reinforcing agent. Cellulose 27, 1393–1406 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10570-019-02904-0

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