RT Journal Article
T1 Enhanced Morphological Characterization of Cellulose Nano/Microfibers through Image Skeleton Analysis
A1 Sánchez Salvador, José Luis
A1 Campano Tiedra, Cristina
A1 López Expósito, Patricio
A1 Tarrés, Quim
A1 Mutjé, Pere
A1 Delgado Aguilar, Marc
A1 Monte Lara, María Concepción
A1 Blanco Suárez, María Ángeles
AB The present paper proposes a novel approach for the morphological characterization of cellulose nano and microfibers suspensions (CMF/CNFs) based on the analysis of eroded CMF/CNF microscopy images. This approach offers a detailed morphological characterization and quantification of the micro and nanofibers networks present in the product, which allows the mode of fibrillation associated to the different CMF/CNF extraction conditions to be discerned. This information is needed to control CMF/CNF quality during industrial production. Five cellulose raw materials, from wood and non-wood sources, were subjected to mechanical, enzymatic, and (2,2,6,6-Tetramethylpiperidin-1-yl)oxyl (TEMPO)-mediated oxidative pre-treatments followed by different homogenization sequences to obtain products of different morphologies. Skeleton analysis of microscopy images provided in-depth morphological information of CMF/CNFs that, complemented with aspect ratio information, estimated from gel point data, allowed the quantification of: (i) fibers peeling after mechanical pretreatment; (ii) fibers shortening induced by enzymes, and (iii) CMF/CNF entanglement from TEMPO-mediated oxidation. Being mostly based on optical microscopy and image analysis, the present method is easy to implement at industrial scale as a tool to monitor and control CMF/CNF quality and homogeneity.
PB MDPI
SN 2079-4991
YR 2021
FD 2021
LK https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/7216
UL https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/7216
LA eng
NO Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (MINECO)
NO Comunidad de Madrid
NO Universidad Complutense de Madrid/Banco de Santander
NO Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación
DS Docta Complutense
RD 10 abr 2025