Hydrogels from Hydrothermal Treatment of Nanocrystalline Cellulose and their Applications

加拿大的纤维素纤维品种被认为是一种丰富的、可再生的有机材料，具有出色的性能和各种现有的、潜在的有用的高需求应用。更具体地说，纳米晶纤维素(CNC)对这项提议特别感兴趣，因为：(I)它是一种独特的材料，具有许多杰出的性能；(Ii)加拿大拥有自己的CNC技术和生产这些材料的专利权；(Iii)CNC在许多应用中的潜在用途尚未得到充分开发。该提案基于我们之前在硫酸盐纸浆悬浮液领域的研究，旨在生产对加拿大经济和不列颠哥伦比亚省经济重要的技术。值得注意的是，许多加拿大和国际公司对以纤维素为基础的生物产品感兴趣，其中包括Domtar、Solegear、Performance Biofiltures、Fibria、Canfor和NorAm，仅举几例。我们与NorAm、Solegear和FP Innovation积极合作，并计划继续和扩大这些合作。长期目标是开发变革性技术，目标是将CNC转化为有用的材料，并将其与可生物降解的聚合物相结合，创造出增值的生物产品。这项提议更具体的目标是首先开发基于数控的水凝胶和聚电解质水凝胶，作为压力、温度和pH等外部刺激的传感器。这些传感器的最佳性能将通过开发分子动力学(MD)方法来模拟聚电解质水凝胶来确定。这一理论框架将计算这些刺激响应型聚电解质“智能”水凝胶的动力学，模拟得到的结果将用于优化水凝胶的性能，使其能够制造。此外，还将利用聚合物接枝碳纳米管来开发生物纳米复合材料。主要目标是首先合成可生物降解的聚合物和微结构可控的共聚物，然后将其接枝到数控纤维上，生成完全可生物降解和环境友好的生物复合材料。最后，通过水凝胶法(完全环保)生产的数控水凝胶将用于稳定油墨和涂料等重要产品，支持加拿大引领从化石经济向可持续和可再生生物经济的转变。这项提议旨在培训从本科(UG)到博士(PhD)不同级别的10名HQP。这项工作的结果将激发业界的兴趣，并将产生资金，在该计划期间将HQP的数量增加一倍，就像过去的情况一样。这项提议的实质是，它旨在开发完全基于生物的“智能”技术应用和产品，这些应用和产品将成为可持续环境中必不可少的基石。

Canada's cellulosic fibre species are known as an abundant, renewable organic material with outstanding properties and a variety of existing and potentially useful, high-demand applications. More specifically nanocrystalline cellulose (CNC) is of particular interest to this proposal due to: (i) it is a unique material possessing a number of outstanding properties; (ii) Canada has its own CNC technologies and patenting rights to produce these materials; (iii) CNC's potential use in many applications is not yet fully explored. The proposal is based on our previous research in the area of kraft pulp suspensions and aims to produce technologies important to the Canadian economy and to that of the province of British Columbia. It is noted that numerous Canadian and International companies exist with interest in cellulose-based bio-products including Domtar, Solegear, Performance Biofilaments, Fibria, Canfor and Noram to name but a few. We have active collaboratons with Noram, Solegear and FPinnovations and we plan to continue and extend these collaborations.The long term objective is to develop transformative technologies that will target to convert CNC into useful materials and in addition combine it with biodegradable polymers to create value-added bio-products. More specific targets of this proposal are first to develop hydrogels and polyelectrolyte hydrogels based on CNC as sensors for external stimuli such as pressure, temperature and pH . The optimum properties of these sensors will be determined by developing a Molecular Dynamics (MD) method to simulate polyelectrolyte hydrogels. This theoretical framework will calculate the dynamics of these stimuli-responsive polyelectrolyte “smart” hydrogels and the results obtained from the simulations will be used to optimise the properties of the hydrogels to enable their manufacture. Moreover the use of polymer grafted CNC will be used to develop bio-nanocomposites. The main goal is to first synthesize biodegradable polymers and co-polymers of controlled microstructure which will be grafted onto the CNC fibers to produce fully biodegradable and environmentally friendly biocomposites. Finally the use of CNC hydrogels that will be produced by hydrogel methods (fully environmentally-friendly) will be used in stabilizing important products such as inks and paints, supporting Canada in leading the transition from a fossil-based economy to a sustainable and renewable bio-economy.This proposal is designed to train 10 HQP at different levels from undergraduate (UG) to PhD. The outcomes from this work will stimulate industrial interest and funding will be generated to double this number of HQP within the period of this program as has been the case in the past. The essence of this proposal is that it aims to develop fully bio-based, “smart” technology applications and products which will be essential building blocks in a sustainable environment.