ePrints

Structure and properties of thermomechanically processed silk peptide and nanoclay filled chitosan

Lookup NU author(s): Professor David XieORCiD

Downloads

• Published version [.pdf]

Licence

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).

Abstract

While chitosan has great potential for biomedical and wider application due to its appealing characteristics such as biocompatibility and inherent antimicrobial activity, its properties usually need to be further tailored for specific uses. In this study, the effect of inclusion of silk peptide (SP) and nanoclays (montmorillonite, MMT and sepiolite, SPT) on the properties of thermomechanically processed chitosan were examined. Blending SP with chitosan led to a material with greater elasticity and surface wettability. For the chitosan matrix, addition of either MMT or SPT resulted in increased mechanical properties with MMT being more effective, likely due to its 2D layered structure. For the chitosan/SP matrix, while inclusion of MMT caused increased mechanical properties and thermal stability, SPT was more effective than MMT at reducing surface hydrophilicity and SPT fully counteracted the increased surface hydrophilicity caused by SP. Thus, this work shows the different effects of MMT and SPT on chitosan-based materials and provides insights into achieving balanced properties.

Publication metadata

Author(s): Chen P, Xie F, Tang F, McNally T

Publication type: Article

Publication status: Published

Journal: Nanocomposites

Year: 2020

Volume: 6

Issue: 3

Pages: 125-136

Print publication date: 18/09/2020

Online publication date: 18/09/2020

Acceptance date: 03/09/2020

Date deposited: 23/05/2023

ISSN (print): 2055-0324

ISSN (electronic): 2055-0332

Publisher: Routledge

URL: https://doi.org/10.1080/20550324.2020.1820796

DOI: 10.1080/20550324.2020.1820796

Altmetrics

Funding

Share