Reuse of waste cotton cloth for the extraction of cellulose nanocrystals

Zhanhong Wang; ZhengJun Yao; Jintang Zhou; Yong Zhang

doi:10.1016/j.carbpol.2016.10.044

Reuse of waste cotton cloth for the extraction of cellulose nanocrystals

Carbohydr Polym. 2017 Feb 10:157:945-952. doi: 10.1016/j.carbpol.2016.10.044. Epub 2016 Oct 18.

Authors

Zhanhong Wang¹, ZhengJun Yao², Jintang Zhou³, Yong Zhang⁴

Affiliations

¹ College of Materials and Technology, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 211100, China; School of Materials Engineering, Yancheng Institute of Technology, Yancheng 224051, Jiangsu, China.
² College of Materials and Technology, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 211100, China; Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Advanced Structural Materials and Application Technology, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 211100, China. Electronic address: Zj_yao2014@163.com.
³ College of Materials and Technology, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 211100, China; Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Advanced Structural Materials and Application Technology, Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing 211100, China. Electronic address: jtzhou2014@163.com.
⁴ School of Materials Engineering, Yancheng Institute of Technology, Yancheng 224051, Jiangsu, China.

PMID: 27988013
DOI: 10.1016/j.carbpol.2016.10.044

Abstract

Cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) were prepared from waste cotton cloth and degreasing cotton was used as a comparison. The cellulose was first extracted by alkali and bleaching treatments, and then the CNCs were isolated by the mix acid solution hydrolysis of cellulose under the controlled conditions. The CNCs were analyzed by Attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, Transmission electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction analysis, thermogravimetric and differential scanning calorimetry analysis. The results confirmed that the resultant samples were the cellulose species, and the CNCs obtained from waste cotton cloth exhibited a high crystallinity index of 55.76±7.82%, which had higher thermostability than that from the degreasing cotton. The morphology analysis results showed that the ranges of length and diameter of CNC extracted from waste cotton cloth were from 28 to 470nm and 3 to 35nm. The preparation of CNCs with a high aspect ratio and good thermostability in this work paves the way for an alternative reuse of waste cotton cloth.

Keywords: Cellulose; Cotton cloth; Nanocrystals; Waste.