Effect of mixing ratio on mechanical properties of mixture of chitin nanofibers and microfibrillated cellulose reinforced PVA hybrid nanocomposites

Abstract

In order to explore the possibility of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) reinforced by mixture of chitin nanofibers (ChNFs) and microfibrillated cellulose (MFC) instead of a single reinforcing phase, mechanical properties of PVA based hybrid nanocomposites reinforced with combination of ChNFs and MFC in various mixing ratios were investigated. For comparison, two different experiments were conducted to prepare nanocomposite films by casting technical processing, where ratios of ChNFs to MFC were mixed varying from 1:0, 4:1, 3:2, 1:1, 2:3, 1:4, and 0:1 in both projects, while in Project 1 the weights of PVA and ChNFs were always kept constant and the weight of PVA only was kept constant in Project 2. The results were as follows: (1) The hybrid ternary nanocomposites acquired the highest Young’s modulus and tensile strength when ratio of ChNFs to MFC was 1:1, which exhibited higher Young’s modulus and higher tensile strength than PVA/ChNFs composites, but delivered higher Young’s modulus and similar tensile strength comparing to PVA/MFC composites; (2) Aggregations and voids inside nanocomposites were detrimental to mechanical properties of PVA based hybrid nanocomposites. In some industries such as food packing, PVA based hybrid nanocomposites at mixing ratio 1:1 of ChNFs to MFC are applied presumably with ChNFs partly instead of MFC in the future.