Title
Compatibility study on nanocellulose and polyethersulfone based blends
Authors
SHUAI WANG SONG XIAOMING and CHEN FUSHAN

Received February 17, 2017
Published Volume 52 Issue 3-4 March-April
Keywords nanocellulose, polyethersulfone, blend system, hydrogen-bonding, compatibility

Abstract
The compatibility of a nanocellulose/polyethersulfone blend system was studied by viscometric methods, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), polarized optical microscopy (POM) and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). The viscometric methods and polarized optical microscopy results were obtained for the blended solution with the weight fraction of polyethersulfone in the range of 0-1.0. Meanwhile, the scanning electron microscopy, infrared spectroscopy and differential scanning calorimetry results were obtained for the transparent films cast from the blended solutions that contained a 0.04 weight fraction of NCC and a 0.18 weight fraction of polyethersulfone. The results demonstrated that partial compatibility existed in the blend system, which may result from the strong hydrogen bonding interaction between the hydroxyl group of NCC and the sulfonyl group of polyethersulfone.