Radially packed cellular nanoarchitectures from delignified plant shells: Multi-scale structures and cell orientation-dependent performance
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A1 Alkuperäisartikkeli tieteellisessä aikakauslehdessä
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en
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12
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Chemical Engineering Journal, Volume 524
Abstract
Engineered wood can be obtained by the targeted removal of non-cellulosics, resulting in the multi-scaled structuring of cellulosic nanofibrils into simple cellular architectures to enable controlled water, heat, and light transport properties useful in a wide range of applications. However, plant tissue with complex cell morphologies have not been explored previously for the creation of engineered plant materials, despite the potential to create asymmetric multiscale materials with enhanced properties. In that context, while wood has cells that are tiled uniformly and unilaterally, nut or seed shells have a wide range of unconventional cell morphologies and packing. Herein, we demonstrate that the delignification of seeds (date pits) with trapezoidal-shaped cells arranged into spheroids, rather than unidirectionally like conventional wood, leads to enhanced mechanics, water dynamics, and organic molecule absorption. For example, we demonstrate that controlling the extent of non-cellulosics removal leads to compressive strengths 17–26 times better than similarly delignified balsa wood. This study highlights the importance of looking beyond wood and exploring new plant cell geometries and packing structures, and we expect this study to open a broad range of new opportunities in the design of sustainable, multi-scaled, cellular materials.Description
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Liu, Q, Salim, M H, Greca, L G, Hai, A, Banat, F, Samad, Y A, Richardson, J J, Beaumont, M & Tardy, B L 2025, 'Radially packed cellular nanoarchitectures from delignified plant shells: Multi-scale structures and cell orientation-dependent performance', Chemical Engineering Journal, vol. 524, 169313. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cej.2025.169313