Production of cellulose nanocrystals from recycled pulp using enzymatic hydrolysis and acid hydrolysis

Abstract

Nanotechnology is increasingly present in the current technological development, because of their different physical and chemical properties that allow you to improve and create new materials with characteristics such as high mechanical strength. Cellulose, one of the most abundant biopolymers on earth can be used as an organic source for obtaining nanocrystals, cellulose crystals of nanometer dimensions which have interesting characteristics for many different applications, from the technological to the biomedical field. For the production of cellulose nanocrystals is necessary to perform the hydrolysis of cellulose, which is the cleavage of bonds between the water molecules of elements, which can be used as a cleavage agent a strong acid (acid hydrolysis) or enzymes (enzyme hydrolysis). Thus, the objective of this project is to study the production and characterization of cellulose nanocrystals using recycled paper pulp by acid hydrolysis and enzymatic hydrolysis in order to verify the influence of some variables specific to each method, and differences between the two methods as the dimensions of the CNC and produced income. The source of raw material, recycled paper pulp will be used in order to verify the viability of production from this source of cellulose lower cost, yet little studied in the literature. (AU)