Investigating rheological property of cellulose filament suspension for industrial fluid application and process improvement

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Cellulose is the most abundant renewable biopolymer in the world and thus production of advanced value-added materials based on cellulose is of significant interest for growth of Canadian bio-based products. Cellulose filaments (CF) are a novel fibrillar material with a constant thickness and high aspect ratio, produced through mechanical refining of pulp fibers.. These cellulose filaments, due to their high mechanical strength, can be used as reinforcing agents in traditional pulp and paper applications, as well as in novel applications, such as for improving the mechanical properties of polymer composites. Additionally, CFs can be used as thickening/gelling agents in industrial fluids for applications in foods, paints, coatings and fracking fluids for oil and gas industry (Grüneberger et al. 2014). Successful commercialization of CF-based/reinforced products for all these applications can only be achieved by understanding and controlling the rheology of this material. In this work, a fundamental rheological study of CF suspensions will be conducted. Effects of different parameters, e.g. filament concentration, electrolyte addition, pH and temperature on the rheology of CFs and CF-supplemented materials will be investigated in order to achieve the desired rheological properties and processability for specific bio-products applications.