Annual Plant: Sources of Fibres, Nanocellulose and Cellulosic Derivatives

As a result of their widespread availability and wide range of technical applications, environmentally friendly natural fiber-based composites are attracting much attention. Unlike synthetic fibers, natural fibers have a wide range of advantages that make them a viable alternative. A rise in concern for the environment, coupled with the possible depletion of global petroleum supplies, has raised the interest in using more renewable resources instead of non-renewable ones to create new products. As a result, the design of new products by combining manmade and natural fibers is promising. On the other hand, natural fibers have become increasingly popular because of their eco-friendly nature. It is essential to understand their behavior to get the most benefits from these fibers. This book chapter aims to provide a comparative evaluation of plant fibers’ mechanical and physical properties. Other characterization investigations such as Fourier transform infrared spectrum, X-ray, and thermogravimetric analyses are also discussed.

The fast growth of pulp and paper companies around the world causes a huge demand for lignocellulosic raw materials. During the last three decades, the pulp and paper manufacturer, especially in countries with poor forest resources, has been spurt to use non-wood fiber as a raw material for cellulose extraction. Non-wood sources including annual and perennial plants have been promising renewable sources to manufacture pulp and paper with acceptable behaviors. The chapter paper intends to give a general background to the employment of attractive lignocellulosic biomass for the manufacture of high-quality paper and pulp. A broad description of the chemical composition of mentioned lignocellulosic biomass is made with conventional wood and other non-wood fiber sources. To assess the suitability of the above plant as a feedstock for paper making, pulp processing, and delignification have been evaluated and presented. Annual and perennial pulps have high-quality deliberated fibers. Handmade papers' physical and mechanical properties have been studied, discussed, and compared with papers from wood and other non-wood resources. The annual and perennial plants could have fiber sources available to papermakers in arid regions in the future. At the end of their life cycle, these products are recycled either for reutilization or as a resource for energy.

Plant residues stand for a potential source of low-cost and renewable cellulose fibers for bioethanol production. Due to recalcitrance nature of these materials, pretreatment corresponds to an intrinsic step for the reduction of cellulose crystallinity and lignin removal. Effective bioconversion with least inhibitory compounds production is critical for an efficient overall ethanol yield. This chapter reviews the multiple types of pretreatments applied for lignocellulosic biomass. It describes the methods of microbial cells immobilization, as well as the effects of biological detoxification on pretreated hydrolysate and subsequent fermentation process. Furthermore, the development of genetic and evolutionary approaches for the enhancement of key microbial traits, including robustness against various inhibitors compounds and stressful environmental conditions, are discussed, highlighting the increasing trend towards consolidated bioprocessing technology.

With the growing demand for more eco-friendly, sustainable, and renewable materials, natural fibers arouse a tremendous interest both from a scientific standpoint as well as industrial prospect. With a high annual production generating huge amounts of by-products of pruning, date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.) stands as one of the most available sources of natural fibers particularly in arid and semi-arid regions. Moreover, nanocellulose is emerging as efficient low-cost nanomaterials with attractive chemical and physical attributes allowing their applications as precursors for the design of biomaterials for sophisticated applications. In conjuncture with increasing interest in developing sustainable economies through the substitution of fossil resources by renewable feedstock, interest in nanocellulose does not seem to wane and they will continue to attract considerable attention within the scientific community and industries. The quest for new sources of cellulose fibers particularly non-woody feedstock to extract novel nanocellulose substrates to fulfill the high demand is therefore primary necessity. This chapter collates the recent developments achieved on the production of nanocellulose substrates from the date palm tree and their potential applications.

Cellulose nanofibrils (CNF) exhibit desirable chemical and physical characteristics, which expand their application range. The eco-friendly nature of cellulose nanofibrils makes them a suitable alternative to meet the current environmental requirements of sustainable development. Therefore, researchers have recently focused their attention on cellulose nanofibrils (CNF) and their composites since the introduction of CNF enables advanced properties and novel uses. In the field of materials, these efforts are reflected in the desire to offer new bio-based materials in the short term capable of replacing toxic or non-biodegradable materials while providing at least equivalent properties. Over the last decades, more research has shown considerable potential for cellulose nanofibrils isolation from various annual plant sources. These have been utilized as fillers to enhance the performance of nanocomposites. This chapter will resume previous research on the production methods adopted for CNF production from annual plants and the suitable characterization approaches used. The present chapter will focus on covering the production processes and the evaluation of the published data on the different mechanical, structural, morphological, and thermal characteristics of the resulting materials assessed through morphological (SEM, TEM, AFM), thermal (TGA/DTG, DSC), structural (XRD, fibrillation degree) and rheological analysis. This chapter is structured in three parts. The first part provides generalities about CNF from the structure to the applications. The second part will cover the chemical and mechanical disintegration approaches usually adopted. The last section focuses on the characterization methods used in literature. It seeks to establish the link between the structure and the properties of CNF, which allows a better understanding of the behavior and provides essential indications for future up-scaling production.

Recently, the integration of new ecofriendly biomaterials has become an important necessity. Therefore, the use of annual plant fibers is becoming more and more important for researchers. The interest of natural plant fibers lies in their specific properties such as biodegradability, abundance, renewable resource, and low cost. Among the bioresources, cactus, which belongs to the Cactaceae family and is originated from Mexico and naturalized in other continents such as the Mediterranean, South Africa and North Africa. Because the composition of plant fibers affects their reinforcing properties, the purification of nanocellulose (cellulose nanofibrils and nanocrystals) from cactus fibers is necessary to improve their use as reinforcing materials in polymer matrices. Indeed, the study of nanocellulose does not only focus on its extraction from biomass, but also on new applications in various fields. The purpose of this chapter is first to introduce cactus fibers from annual plant, their description and classification. Next, our focus will be on the different extraction technics of nanocellulose from cactus fibers, including its chemical composition. While the last part of this chapter will cover the cactus fibers morphological, structural, mechanical and thermal properties.

The corn cereal besides being a source of food for humans and used in the production of animal feed, is together with its agricultural residues a profitable and rich source of cellulose obtaining cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) and cellulose nanofibrils (CNFs). Its properties such as biodegradability, biocompatibility, biobased, high mechanical strength,  specific surface area and thermal stability, transparency, viscosity modifier, make it possible to develop materials for various areas such as environmental, electronics, biomedicine, pharmaceutical, materials engineering and others; generating added value to the agricultural residues of the corn crop that was previously incinerated for energy generation and now it is of great scientific interest with applications in nanotechnology and nanoscience. In this chapter will be depicted the obtaining of CNCs from corn crop residues.

In recent years, world's population has grown at a very high rate, with an expected increase of 2 billion people by 2050. To afford this, agriculture has relied on techniques that seek to obtain the highest possible harvest yield, having as the main disadvantage the great environmental impact it means, emitting a large amount of greenhouse gases (GHGs) during activities such as soils management and biomass burning, consuming a vast amount of energy in greenhouses and machinery, and polluting water bodies through agrochemicals leaching, eutrophication, etc. These facts have led to an increase in stress conditions for crops, causing a change in their location or even drastically reducing the cropland area in certain countries. However, nanotechnology has new and multiple approaches to face these problems through the study of nano-scale particles (≈100 nm). Nanocellulose, an easily accessible, renewable, biodegradable, and versatile polymer, is being studied in detail due to the multiple advantages that it offers compared to other materials. The objective of this chapter is to show the latest applications of nanocellulose in agriculture (in enhanced-efficiency fertilizers (EEFs), controlled release formulations (CRFs) of pesticides, water management and bioremediation of water resources, food packaging films, …). Overall, all these recent applications converge in the use of agricultural waste to obtain this polyvalent biomaterial, whose application seeks to partially or totally replace other polymers obtained from non-renewable resources in the search for sustainable agriculture.

Composites made of annual plants, based on polymer matrix reinforced with ligno-cellulosic material, have been extensively used in construction, automotive industry, marine etc. due to their tailored properties and acceptable costs. Petroleum-based adhesives (most of them based on methane and formaldehyde), a principal matrix for lignocellulosic-based composites, include more than 85% from all the resins used yearly in the world. Their utilization can cause air pollution and health damages for humans because of the toxic substances (e.g. formaldehyde). Considering the scarcity of gas and petroleum reserves and the environmental concerns on high-emission and non-recyclable materials, researchers are trying to develop new alternative resins based on biomass or by-products of many industries. This chapter includes the use of alternative adhesives for composites with annual plants derived from food industry, as casein, polylactic acid, starch and soybean, pharmaceutical industry, as chitosan and cement industry as mineral binders, including here cement, lime, gypsum and geopolymers.

In this century, notable advancements have been observed in green technology in the field of materials science through the creation of biocomposites in response to the effects of global warming and environmental sustainability. Natural fiber-reinforced biopolymers are termed biocomposites. Due to their exceptional physicochemical and mechanical properties, natural fibers already have a leading share in the composite area. In addition, natural fiber has numerous advantages over synthetic fiber, including biodegradability, biocompatibility, light-weight, low cost, higher life-cycle performance, eco-friendliness, renewability, and improved mechanical properties. As a result, researchers have been working on these materials as a replacement for non-renewable, obstinate, or toxic materials. Moreover, biocomposites made from natural resources greatly enhance viability in the design of materials for future generations, and over the past decade, they have achieved significant expansion in the residential sector, architectural features, aviation industry, circuit boards, and automobile industries. Thus, making fiberboards from biocomposites reinforced with natural fibers from annual plants will be incredibly effective in terms of the fiberboard’s mechanical and thermal properties. This chapter focuses on the mechanical properties of fiberboards manufactured from biocomposites which are reinforced with annual plant fibers. Bast fibers, leaf fibers, seed fibers, core fibers, grass and reed fibers, as well as other varieties such as wood and roots, are all-natural fibers extracted from annual plants.

Currently, the massive use of petroleum-based composites is causing many serious environmental problems, which concern the whole society. To reduce their use and gradually replace them with environmentally friendly materials, much research is focused on the development of nanocomposites with bio-based reinforcing elements produced from renewable resources. Among the potential bio-reinforcements, cellulosic fibers contained inside annual plants offer several advantages that allow their use in many sectors such as automotive, construction, food packaging, etc. However, annual plants are currently not being used to their full potential. Some parts of plants are simply not being exploited. The literature abounds with studies on the extraction of cellulose fibers and fibrils as well as nanocrystals that are part of their structure. Cellulose nanocrystals (CNC) often have good reinforcing properties due to their microstructures and high crystallinity. This chapter will first introduce annual plant fibers and their structure. In the second part, the physicochemical properties and extraction processes of nanocrystalline cellulose will be discussed. While the last part will present nanocomposites-based CNC and deal with their morphological, mechanical, thermal barrier and rheological properties.

This chapter provides a comprehensive review of the processes used to deconstruct cellulosic fibers into cellulose nanomaterials (CNM) and their use in one of the most promising applications, namely, engineered (bio)plastics. We focus on the preparation of CNM via chemical and enzymatic pretreatments and discuss the most recent developments in related areas. The mechanical processes used to isolate CNM are described, with an emphasis on their effect on morphological and strength development. We also provide a comparative analysis of the industrialization potential of the most important methods to incorporate CNM in polymeric matrices. Classical and emerging uses of CNM in engineering (bio)plastics are presented, considering (i) CNM dispersion in polymer matrices to develop nanocomposites and, (ii) CNM adsorption at interfaces in polymer blends and composites to build hierarchical structures. The dispersion/orientation state of CNM in such materials and the underlying physical–chemical phenomena related to interfacial interactions between CNM and the polymer phase are discussed. The latter takes into consideration the impact of CNM on the development of functional materials. Overall, this chapter offers essential knowledge to facilitate the conversion of cellulosic fibers into CNM and their implementation in the field of composites.

For years, the renewable and very abundant lignocellulosic fiber has attracted the attention of several research groups around the world for applications in various industries: technical textiles, pulp and paper, biocomposites, bioethanol, and construction activities. These fibers have been cultivated, processed, and used in different climatic zones around the world. There are many similarities in the physical and chemical characteristics of lignocellulosic fibers from annual plants. However, each type of fiber has its unique chemical composition, anatomical structure, and physical, chemical, and mechanical properties. Also, before using natural fiber, it is essential to know its characteristics as well as the factors influencing its performance. The interest in annual plant fibers today is evident. Indeed, the structure hierarchy of lignocellulosic fibers allows the extraction of cellulosic particles of nanometric size (nanocellulose). Nanocellulose includes essentially two categories of nanoparticles, namely cellulose nanofibrils (CNF) and cellulose nanocrystals (CNC). This chapter will first introduce the lignocellulosic fibers as well as a brief description of perennials. A bibliographical summary of the methods of preparation and extraction of cellulose and its derivatives will also be detailed. The last part will be devoted to the different used characterization of cellulosic derivatives from the annual plant.

The widespread recognition of environmental, social, and financial imperatives, the hunt for environmentally friendly, sustainable technology, the escalating waste issue, environmental law requirements, and the depletion of fossil fuel supplies underlie the focus of scientific research on the development of eco-friendly materials. Lignocellulosic fiber is among the most studied natural materials due to its impressive economic and environmental characteristics. However, its use as an alternative to petroleum compounds requires in-depth knowledge of its structure, properties, and interactions with other materials of a different nature. However, even if these fibers have little interest in being used directly in composites, the constituent elements can still be exploited. Cellulose is the element that contributes the most to the structural properties of annual plants, is a good example. The first part of this chapter will describe the annual plant fibers and their structure and molecular organization. At the same time, the second part will deal with the cellulose's physical-chemical characteristics and those of its derivatives.

With increasingly strict environmental protection legislation, industrial development leads to a high need for low-cost and high-performance adsorbents. Due to their availability and eco-friendly character as well as their high porosity, activated carbons are exploited in diversified applications such as adsorption of pollutants in the liquid or gas phase, as well as in catalysis, and energy or gas storage. Activated carbon designates carbon materials with a high porosity and surface area, which has numerous uses in environmental and industrial applications for the removal, recovery, isolation, and processing of several gaseous and liquid phase compounds. Hence, biomass lignocellulosic material derived from agricultural by-products has shown its potential as a valuable raw material for the production of activated carbon, mainly for its low-price availability. Many investigations on lignocellulosic materials as an efficient precursor for activated carbon preparation have been published by different researchers. This chapter illustrates an outline of the different methods of preparation of activated carbon and their available forms and their surface functions and their application in wastewater treatment.

Synthetic dyes are complex organic compounds that can change the color of several substrates which explains their wide field of application in textile, paper, leather, cosmetic, food, pharmaceutical, and printing inks industries. In this chapter, we present detailed information on synthetic dyes characterized by a complex structure and heterogeneous composition intended to provide them good fixation rate as well as good resistance to the degrading agents which make them recalcitrant to conventional wastewater treatments. The presence of residual dyes after use in wastewater, even in small amounts, causes an aesthetic problem in addition to water pollution and constitutes not only a potential danger for humans and their environment but also a source of public complaint. Manufacturers are then required to treat their effluents before it is disposed off. The challenge for researchers is to find effective solutions, easy to implement and use, without requiring a lot of investment; dyes  adsorption on bio–based materials appears to meet these requirements. Indeed, annual plants have been employed successfully as bio–adsorbents due to their promising properties including availability, non–toxicity, cost–effectiveness, renewable nature, and good performance whether as fresh biomass, chemically modified plants, agriculture wastes, biochar, or activated carbon. Accordingly, this chapter explores the adsorption process of different dye classes into many varieties of annual plants. The preparation techniques are described, the effect of the adsorption control parameters and mechanisms are discussed. Finally, various challenges related to the use of annual plants are highlighted and some prospects are outlined.

Schinus molle L. is a part of the Anacardiaceae family originates from South America and expanded in Mediterranean region and Africa. Many researches have examined the morphological and physicochemical properties of this plant. Some reviews and primary scientific studies were undertaken to identify this species which are used in traditional treatment of different health and environmental problems. Three hundred and seventy-five research papers and reviews are confirming that the plant has a high efficiency in different field. In this context, the objective of this chapter is to summarize the importance and the different fields of application of the Schinus molle.