Fabrication and Evaluation of Filtration Membranes from Industrial Polymer Waste.

Polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) polymers are known for their diverse range of industrial applications and are considered important raw materials for membrane manufacturing. In view of circularity and resource efficiency, the present work mainly deals with the reusability of waste polymer 'gels' produced during the manufacturing of PVDF membranes. Herein, solidified PVDF gels were first prepared from polymer solutions as model waste gels, which were then subsequently used to prepare membranes via the phase inversion process.

Effect of cellulose nanocrystals on chitosan/PVA/nano β-TCP composite scaffold for bone tissue engineering application.

The need for an ideal tissue construct has lead to the search of a myriad of polymer composites with desirable properties. The nature, location and type of tissue to be regenerated determines the type of material to be used. A bone construct has its own requirements such as osteoconductivity, mineralization tendency, synchronized degradation rate, osteogenic differentiation potential etc, which results in search of new possible combination of materials aimed to improve tissue response.

Effect of incorporation of montmorillonite on Xylan/Chitosan conjugate scaffold.

The present study reports the fabrication of Xylan/Chitosan/Montmorillonite (MMT) composite scaffold by freeze drying process with the aim of achieving improved properties for bone tissue engineering applications. The scaffolds were characterized using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and mechanical testing. The fabricated scaffolds were found to be highly porous with variations in pore size (102 μm-290 μm) on varying the filler concentration.

Lipophilic 5-fluorouracil prodrug encapsulated xylan-stearic acid conjugates nanoparticles for colon cancer therapy.

In this study, self-assembled nanoparticles based on amphiphilic xylan-stearic acid (Xyl-SA) conjugates have been developed for the efficient delivery of 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) in cancer therapy. The self-assembled behavior of Xyl-SA conjugates in aqueous medium was investigated using pyrene as fluorescent probe. To enhance the loading efficacy of 5-FU, the lipophilic 5-fluorouracil-stearic acid (5-FUSA) prodrug was synthesized and subsequently encapsulated into the hydrophobic core of Xyl-SA NPs.

Studies on cellulose nanocrystals isolated from groundnut shells.

Today, various renewable biomass resources are accepted as waste material and are mostly burnt or used as cattle feed. The commercial value of these wastes can be increased by utilising them in production of nanomaterials. So, the present work was conducted for isolation of cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) from groundnut shells which are produced annually as waste in large quantity (∼7 million tons).