Conversion of methyl cellulose from the stalk of oil palm empty fruit bunch for food and bioproduct applications

Foo, Lin Xing (2017) Conversion of methyl cellulose from the stalk of oil palm empty fruit bunch for food and bioproduct applications. [Project Paper] (Submitted)

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Abstract

As one of the largest oil palm producer in the world, Malaysia produces massive amounts of biomass by-product such as empty fruit bunch (EFB) fibers. These EFB fibers i.e. EFB stalks consist of high cellulose content and potential to be converted to methyl cellulose (MC). This study is an initial attempt to isolate cellulose from EFB stalk and converted it to MC for food and bioproduct application. During this work, formic acid delignification was used to isolate the cellulose and converted to MC by using dimethyl sulfate (DMS). From the lignocellulosic analysis, 59.04wt% of α-cellulose content was identified in the extracted cellulose and 52wt% was successfully extracted from EFB stalk. The extracted cellulose was then converted to MC with the yield of 47wt%. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) micrographs show that the morphology of converted methylcellulose can be comparable to the morphology of the commercial methylcellulose. The intensities ratio of the O-H stretching band (3400 cm−1 ) and the C-H stretching band (2900 cm−1 ) of MC is lower than the observed for the delignified cellulose. Based on the TG analysis result, the double stages decomposition was indicated in the converted methylcellulose which show that the compound was consisting of heterogeneous structure. The obtained results in this work demonstrate the impurities in the α-cellulose content of EFB stalk affect the MC conversion

Item Type:	Project Paper
Faculty:	Faculty of Engineering
Depositing User:	Ms. AZLINA ZAINAL ABIDIN
Date Deposited:	01 Nov 2022 03:20
Last Modified:	10 Nov 2022 07:15
URI:	http://psaspb.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/510

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