Facing environmental issues, especially over single-use plastics, the packaging industry has an urgent need for new biosourced materials leading to efficient barrier properties. The cellulose-based materials are part of the potential solutions towards this problem. Gathering a great number of advantages like renewability, recyclability, and biodegradability, cellulose has also a diversity of scales and surface chemistry possibilities. Cellulose nanofibrils (CNF) are particularly interesting in this field due to their high specific area allowing the formation of light and dense material resistant to oxygen penetration and grease absorbency. However, CNF are lacking water resistance unfulfilling a great number of packaging applications.<br/>This study presents the hydrophobization of cellulose by grafting fatty chains (FC) by mechanochemistry using a vibratory ball milling under atmospheric conditions. This technic allows chemical modification without solvent and with reduced reaction times. The chemical modification is proved by direct methods (FTIR, XPS, elementary analysis). The structural changes of the cellulose are also monitored through morphological analysis (optical microscopy, SEM, TEM), crystallinity (XRD) and degree of polymerization. By varying the intensity and the time of the reaction, various functionalized (nano)cellulose can be produced. Surface and barrier properties of grafted materials have been tested with promising results linked to hydrophobicity.

Using mechanochemistry for simultaneous comminution and hydrophobization of (nano)cellulose

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