Hot-mould foaming of modified hemicelluloses and hydroxypropyl methylcellulose

Abstract

Plastics are a material group which have revolutionized the materials industry during the past century. However, the often fossil origin and littering of the material is problematic. Therefore, this study aims at exploring natural polymers, such as cellulose derivatives and hemicelluloses from different botanical origins, and demonstrate the possibility to use these polymers in a foaming application. The hemicelluloses were chemically treated in order to enhance their performance and foams with ratios as high as 4:1 of hemicellulose and the cellulose derivative, respectively, were successfully produced by a hot-mould foaming technique. The foams were found to be thermally stable up to about 280 °C. The chemical modifications were confirmed by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectra and the foams were evaluated with regard to their liquid absorption capacity as well as their density. After 1 min the best foam absorbed 12.5 g/g of liquid and after 30 min soak time and centrifugation the foams had absorption capacities between 2 and 5 g/g. All foams exhibited densities below 0.1 g/cm3. In both the absorption test and density evaluation, the foams produced from mainly hemicellulose performed in a similar way as the reference foams based only on the cellulose derivative, which is considered an impressive result since cellulose is often reported to have superior properties to hemicelluloses.