Cellulose nanomaterials have gained a lot of notice recently owing to their impressive mechanical and thermal properties, environmental benefit, low toxicity and relatively low cost.   One application space is as a “barrier” layer for food packaging primarily to replace synthetic polymer barrier layers such as ethylene vinyl alcohol, polyvinylalcohol and others.  Here we present the fundamental permeability behavior of cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) and cellulose nanofibrils (CNFs), as well as our efforts to utilize these materials as barrier layers in packaging.  We detail our processing methods and integration efforts and report relevant packaging related technical metrics. We show that CNC and CNF do have potential as barrier layers in real-world packaging, but do not quite meet current synthetic material metrics in use, primarily due to water sensitivity.

Cellulose nanomaterials as sustainable water and oxygen barrier layers for food packaging

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