It is important for producers of coatings to control flow and stability. The way to do this in water borne systems has typically been a work for synthetically derived additives, water-soluble cellulose derivatives or clays. Can cellulose fibrils do anything new for you?

Continuously following the world of cellulose fibrils and the development is both dynamic and interesting. A lot of new inventions are taking place, based on the cellulose fibrils. We have given 3D printing a quite high focus in the last couple of reviews, but this week there are two other news items on the list: composites made from cellulose fibrils. Dig into this week’s research review to find out more on what might possibly be the next generation of composite materials.

The performance coatings sector has seen decades of development to protect installations and transportation equipment. The sector has been highly dominated by solvent based systems and these systems have seen incremental innovations for a long period of time. The end-user demands for these systems have been set in a context of a world in an ever-changing environment: high pressure on efficiency, increased globalization and international trade, as well as the period of increased climate focus. So how is this world going to look in the near future? In my attempt to share thoughts on this subject, I will focus on the rheology system, how its currently being solved and how it can be solved with alternative, more environmentally friendly technologies in the future.

Never heard of Cellulose Fibrils? Don't worry, I will guide you through the things you need to know. Cellulose fibrils is a completely new performance additive made from natural raw materials, designed to outperform current oil-based technologies. I will during this article give you a quick overview of what cellulose fibrils is, its characteristics and functionalities, and what you can do with it.

Dr. Julien Bras from the Grenoble Institute of Techonology has been working in the field of cellulose fibrils, nanocellulose and microfibrillated cellulose for two decades. He is considered as one of the pioneers on the concept as we know it today. In this 5 minutes chat with Dr. Bras, we touched upon several topics regarding this new material. Do not miss out on the opportunity to listen in to Dr, Bras ideas one some of the directions the cellulose fibrils and nanocellulose will be taking in the future. 

Cellulose fibrils has been present in the academic sector since the 1980’s, but it is completely newborn in a commercial sense. I experience from time to time that the mix up between cellulose fibrils and soluble cellulose (polymers) can create issues in understanding the full potential of the fibrils within a formulation. In this blog post I will try to give you a brief overview of why cellulose fibrils is quite different from the other types of cellulose products as you have learned to know them.

Within the field of nanocellulose and cellulose fibrils, there is an increasingly rapid pace of new developments, where the cellulose fibrils either appear on its own or as a part of an advanced relationship between several performance enhancers. Today I have collected two highly interesting, but very separate news articles for you, but where the common denominator is the ability to retrieve strength and performance from these types of materials. Enjoy!

Another episode of Topic Tuesday where we break down the rheological profile of cellulose fibrils under certain conditions. This week we will show you the robustness of your product's rheology profile under different temperatures when using cellulose fibrils.

This week’s blog post started its life when I attended a stakeholder forum which was organized by the Bio-Based Industries Joint Undertaking (BBIJU), a part of the EU H2020 initiative. I listened to a high number of innovators within several fields such as bio-fuels, bio-chemicals, as well as new and more sustainable materials. I started a line of thought, where the word paradigm occurred to me; I am part of a generation raised in the latter part of the 20th century where a majority of things we take for granted are based on technologies from the petroleum sector. The paradigm has given opportunities and challenges, but how does this paradigm affect us and our thoughts on innovation?

This weeks topic is a follow-up from our last Topic Tuesday. Then we talked about the shear thinning properties of cellulose fibrils. Now, we show you the recovery effect and properties - the thixotropy - of the cellulose fibrils back to its original viscosity. With practical examples!