Abstract
In this study, bamboo was treated with an optimized surface furfurylation process. With this process, dimensionally stable and highly biologically durable bamboo material could be prepared without mechanical reduction. The anti-swelling efficiency (ASE) could reach 50% with a low weight percent gain (WPG about 13%). By using SEM, nanoindentation, and Imaging FTIR, we demonstrated that this high performance improvement is attributed to the unique furfuryl alcohol (FA) resin distribution pattern in the modified bamboo, namely a higher concentration of FA resin located in the region near to the surface of bamboo, and what is more, the preferred distribution of FA resin within the cell walls of parenchyma cells, which is known to be the weak point of bamboo both for biological durability and mechanical performances. Such graded modified bamboo could be utilized as a reliable engineering material for outdoor applications.
Highlights
Bamboo, an evergreen plant belonging to the Gramineae family and Bambuseae subfamily, is the second most abundant forest resource with integrated economic, ecological, and social benefits [1,2,3].It is featured with strong mechanical performances, fast growth, high yield, easy propagation, multiple and wide utilization [4,5,6]
The weight percent gain (WPG) of bamboo samples could reach 13.3% after the surface furfurylation, which indicated that the furfuryl alcohol (FA) polymer was successfully introduced into bamboo structure
The reduction in equilibrium moisture content (EMC) is primarily caused by the introduction of hydrophobic FA resin into the cell walls, which prevents the water molecules from reaching the hydrophilic polymers in the cell walls and decreases the absorption of water molecules in bamboo [10]
Summary
An evergreen plant belonging to the Gramineae family and Bambuseae subfamily, is the second most abundant forest resource with integrated economic, ecological, and social benefits [1,2,3]. It is featured with strong mechanical performances, fast growth, high yield, easy propagation, multiple and wide utilization [4,5,6]. Bamboo material is susceptible to degradation by fungi mainly due to its high nutritious content compared to wood [7], making it a serious problem for any bamboo enterprise during storage, processing and transportation. Some surface functional modifications with nanocoating of ZnO and/or TiO2 have been used to improve bamboo performances such as durability [13,14], but the dimensional stability was little or only slightly improved [15,16]
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