Strengthening soy for better bioplastics
Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis using surface chemistry to improve the strength of soy and cellulose-based biomaterials
Soy proteins are used in plant-based natural polymers meant to eventually supplant plastic materials. But to compete with the petrochemical-based products, those polymers need to be stronger and less brittle.
Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis have developed a method to do that, in a study published in the journal Polymer Composites. The research was headed up by Marcus Foston, professor in energy, environmental & chemical engineering at the McKelvey School of Engineering. Foston, who is also director of the Synthetic biology Manufacturing of Advanced materials Research Center (SMARC), studies how to repurpose biomass waste into useful chemicals and materials.
One such example of biomass waste is cellulose, the most abundant natural polymer on earth. Researchers can yield cellulose nanocrystals from microfibrils of many plant sources and those nanocrystals make good scaffolding for bioplastic materials, but they could be better. In this study, the team found they could further strengthen the nanocomposite properties of this material by modifying the surface interactions of the nanocrystals. Using a surface coating of polydopamine, a molecule inspired from the sticky adhesive proteins in mussels, the team was able to increase the nanocomposites’ tensile strength and flexibility by more than 300%.
The work serves as a proof of concept that naturally derived materials like cellulose and soy protein can be optimized to better compete with conventional plastics.
Wang Z, Li H, Hanxun Jin, Senanayake M, Pingali SV, Goldberg W, Kobayashi D, Guy Genin G, Foston M. Tuning Sustainable Nanocomposite Interphase Behavior Through Surface Modification of Cellulose Nanocrystals. Polymer Composites (2025) https://doi.org/10.1002/pc.70050
This work was supported by the National Science Foundation through awards DMR 2105150, CMMI 1548571, and OIA 2219142. A portion of this work was supported under the funding to the Center for Structural Molecular Biology (CSMB) under Contract FWP ERKP291, Office of Biological and Environmental Research, U.S. Department of Energy.
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