Biodegradable cellulose films have high mechanical strength, excellent flexibility, and good transparency, which are potential candidate materials to replace petroleum-based packaging materials and disposable products. However, the poor hydrophobicity of cellulose films seriously limits their practical application. Herein, self-healing hydrophobic films were fabricated by incorporating natural wax into cellulose matrix. The effects of types of natural waxes, wax content, and annealing temperature on the performances of films were systematically investigated. The resultant films exhibited good hydrophobicity (water contact angle: ∼120°), and high tensile strength (>120 MPa), which could be completely biodegraded in natural soil (within 81 days). Importantly, the self-healing of hydrophobic films could be achieved by releasing wax from inside to surface of cellulose matrix during the annealing process. This work demonstrated a facile strategy for designing and developing hydrophobic and self-healable cellulose-based materials for packaging materials to replace petrochemical plastics, which is conducive to alleviate environmental problems caused by nondegradable plastic pollution.
The research successfully produced stable nanoemulsions by incorporating nonionic emulsifiers and environmentally friendly natural waxes. The primary focus of the study was to investigate the specific contributions of nonionic emulsifiers toward enhancing the stability of emulsions. The examination of emulsion properties in the study sheds light on how both formulation and processing methods impact the overall characteristics of the emulsions. The process of natural wax formation in the study involved using a mixture containing 10 wt% of natural wax, and 12 wt% of a complex emulsifier with a hydrophilic-lipophilic balance (HLB) value of 9.86. The emulsification was carried out at a temperature of 95 °C, with a stirring speed of 900 r/min, and an emulsification time of 10 min. The wax emulsion is stabilized by a nonionic emulsifier that creates a protective film at the interface between the water and wax. This film effectively prevents the two substances from separating, thus maintaining the stability of the emulsion. The amount of nonionic emulsifier in the interfacial film can be changed by adjusting the HLB value, the ratio of emulsifier, and the ratio of natural wax. In this way, the thickness and area of the interfacial film can be varied to regulate the particle size, zeta potential, and viscosity of the emulsion. When only the emulsification process is adjusted, the properties of the emulsion have the same trend.
We present a novel collagen-based hydrophobic aerogel for oil/water separation. The key feature of our approach is based on all-biomass materials, combined with effective crosslinking of collagen and dialdehyde carboxymethyl cellulose (DCMC) and hydrophobic coating by naturally derived waxes. The results show that the collagen with small amount of DCMC (∼0.25 wt%) under freezing and subsequent lyophilization can result in a spongy-like aerogel substrate with hierarchical structure and great reversible compressibility . The waxes coating not only maintains the interconnected porous structure, but also confers the micro/nano-scale wrinkling patterns on the resulting WC-Col aerogel surfaces. The hydrophobicity and lipophilicity of WC-Col aerogel is thus significantly improved as evidenced by a high contact angle of 144.4° and selective adsorption of oils from water. The repeated adsorption-squeezing tests demonstrate its reasonably good adsorption capacities and recyclability for varied oily liquids. Our study provides an ingenious approach to exploitation of biomass in pollutants removal.
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