Composites of Vegetable Oil-Based Polymers and Carbon Nanomaterials

Abstract

Owed to current environmental concerns and crude oil price fluctuations, the design of feasible substitutes to petroleum-based polymeric materials is a major challenge. A lot of effort has been focused on transforming natural vegetable oils (VOs), which are inexpensive, abundant, and sustainable, into polymeric materials. Different nanofillers have been combined with these bio-based polymer matrices to improve their thermal, mechanical, and antibacterial properties. The development of multifunctional nanocomposites materials facilitates their application in novel areas such as sensors, medical devices, coatings, paints, adhesives, food packaging, and other industrial appliances. In this work, a brief description of current literature on polymeric nanocomposites from vegetable oils reinforced with carbon nanomaterials is provided, in terms of preparation, and properties. Different strategies to improve the nanomaterial state of dispersion within the biopolymer matrix are discussed, and a correlation between structure and properties is given. In particular, the mechanical, thermal, and electrical properties of these natural polymers can be considerably enhanced through the addition of small quantities of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs), multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs), graphene (G), or its derivatives such as graphene oxide (GO) or fullerenes (C60). Finally, some current and potential future applications of these materials in diverse fields are briefly discussed.

The Effect of Gamma Irradiation, Salinity and Nano-Fertilizer on the Biological Parameters of Brassica napus L. Cultivated in Iraq

“…Second part of experiments focusing on the chemical composition of oils in local var olifera grown at field fertilized with conventional fertilizer and nano fertilizer; finding presented in figure (3) illustrated the logarithmic differences in fatty acids in both cultivation methods; the findings of the work have shown significant variation in the percentage of fatty acids in each method for rapeseed oil under two methods of agriculture (conventional fertilizer and nano-fertilizer). The content of erucic acid was under the limit value in both cultivation protocols; non-significant increase in the percentage of erucic under nano-fertilizer application and according to the definition, Canola contains particular erucic acid (2%) cut-off values that allow it to be utilized in human and animal nutrition [36,37]. EU regulation restricts oils and fats used in products to have less than 5% erucic acid, indicated as a percentage of fat, with stricter limits for baby meals (EC Regulation No.…”

Recent advances in synthesis of polymers based on palm oil and its fatty acids

“…127 Preparation and properties studies of polymeric nanocomposites derived from vegetable oils with carbon nanomaterials as reinforcements have been reported. 25,128 Oil palm products (palm oil and palm kernel oil) have been used as raw material feedstocks for polymer synthesis, as described in this review. Moreover, there is also lignocellulosic biomass produced from the oil palm tree, which includes oil palm trunk (OPT), palm pressed ber, fronds, empty fruit bunch (EFB), and shells.…”

Sustainable Vegetable Oil-Based Biomaterials: Synthesis and Biomedical Applications

“…Generally, biopolymers derived from vegetable oils have limited applications, since they have poor mechanical properties and are often fragile, do not have adequate stiffness and strength for structural applications, have high gas and vapor permeability and have a low deflection temperature (HDT, heat distortion temperature) [86,87]. To counteract these drawbacks, functionalization represents a very effective strategy to improve or modulate the mechanical or thermal properties of these polymers and make them more similar to the standards of petroleum-derived plastic materials.…”