In the recent years, biomaterials from renewable sources have shown potential in medicine and materials science alike. They are rapidly expanding class of materials and have been of interest in the recent decades due to their abundance, low cost, biocompatibility, and tunable morphological and physicochemical properties. Cellulose is appealing to the industry due to its crystalline and amorphous polymorphs; while silk is made up of flexible protein fibers, is attractive due to its tunable biodegradation and excellent biocompatibility. When these two natural biomacromolecules are mixed together, their properties can be tuned by changing material composition and fabrication method (i.e. solvent type, coagulation agent and temperature). Reduced graphene oxide (rGO) is an ideal compound to increase molecular interactions and stabilization of these two components. In addition, being strong oxidizing agent, it offers hydrophilicity giving it good solubility properties. In this study, we aim to understand how rGO molecules affect the carbohydrate crystallinity and protein secondary structure formation as well as their physicochemical properties including ionic conductivity. The fabricated biocomposites with rGO were investigated using Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), X-Ray Scattering, Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC), and Thermogravimetric Analysis (TGA). The results showed that the addition of rGO stabilizes the morphology and thermal properties of the biocomposites. The results also demonstrated that the cellulose crystallinity and the silk beta sheet content influence the ionic conductivity of the materials. <br/>

Characterization of silk/cellulose biocomposites infused with rGO

Macromolecular Chemistry: The Second Century

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ACS Spring 2020 National Meeting & Expo

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.