Preparation and Characterization of Superabsorbent Polymers Based on Sawdust.

Mingchang Zhang,Zhuoran Chen,Mingzhi Wang,Jinzhen Cao,Shaodi Zhang,Ruoshui Wang

doi:10.3390/polym11111891

Abstract

Sawdust, a cheap by-product of the timber and forestry industry, was considered as a framework structure to prepare superabsorbent polymer with acrylic acid (AA) and acrylamide (AM), the synthetic monomers. The effects of initiator content, crosslinker content, AA content, AM content, degree of neutralization of AA, and reaction temperature on the swelling rate of superabsorbent polymer were investigated. The synthesized polymer was characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). Under optimal synthesis conditions, the results showed that the swelling rate of the polymer in deionized water and 0.9% NaCl solution reached 738.12 and 90.18 g/g, respectively. The polymer exhibits excellent swelling ability, thermal stability, and reusability. After the polymer was introduced into the samples (soil or coal), the water evaporation rate of the samples was significantly reduced, and the saturated water holding capacity and pore structure were also significantly improved.

Highlights

Superabsorbent polymer (SAP) is a new material with a three-dimensional network structure [1,2,3].It can absorb as much water as hundreds to thousands of times of its own weight in a short time without dissolving [4,5,6]
Sawdust serves as the framework structure and acrylic acid (AA) and AM as grafting monomers
The functional groups, crystallinity, and microscopic surface morphology of sawdust and the SW-gAA-g-AM polymer were analyzed by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM), respectively, which confirmed that the SW-AA-AM polymer was successfully prepared

Summary

Introduction

Superabsorbent polymer (SAP) is a new material with a three-dimensional network structure [1,2,3].It can absorb as much water as hundreds to thousands of times of its own weight in a short time without dissolving [4,5,6]. Superabsorbent polymer (SAP) is a new material with a three-dimensional network structure [1,2,3]. Bio-waste, especially agricultural by-products such as starch [19], soy protein [20], and straw [21,22,23], have been considered for the preparation of SAP. These bio-wastes are non-toxic, renewable, biocompatible, and biodegradable. The proposal of this scheme improves the utilization efficiency of biological waste, and reduces the production cost of SAP. Such materials usually require chemical reagents for pretreatment before preparing SAP [24,25,26,27]

Methods

Results

Conclusion