Design of a nanobiomaterial from renewable resources

In recent years, a large emphasis has been placed on the use of renewable resources to less heavily rely on petroleum and to better utilize global energy needs. However, the lack of rigidity of nature's materials typically limits their mass production for high-tech applications. One promising approach to address this shortcoming is to introduce a composite material reinforced by high purity nanofibers found in nature. Cellulose nanowhiskers (CNWs), the most abundant biopolymer on earth, could integrate a viable nanofibrous porous candidate resulting in superior structural diversity and functional versatility for diverse applications from automotive industry to bioengineering design. Inspired by these fascinating properties, a fully cellulose-based composite was designed using the CNWs reinforcement and their oriented morphology. Comparable to carbon nanotubes or kevlar, CNWs introduced significant strength and directional rigidity to the composite even at 0.2 wt% yet doubled that under magnetic field of only 0.3T. The tendency of CNWs to interconnect with one another confirmed the formation of a three-dimensional rigid percolating network, fact which imparted an excellent mechanical rigidity to the entire structure at such low filler content. Hence, the green nanobiomaterial with an enhanced microstructure performance in this study could potentially increase the biomedical applications of cellulose-based materials.