Improving the thermal stability of wood-based cellulose by esterification

BNZ was selected over PIV to modify the WCNF. Benzoylation increased the 1% weight loss temperature (WLT) of WCNF by 25 °C and improved its resistance against thermal weight loss at the early stage of degradation and discoloration. Unlike the results of NBKP, changing the DS from 0.4-1.1 did not show variation in the thermal behavior of WCNF esters. The effect of esterifying the hemicellulose in WCNF was not clearly observed possibly due to the formation of reducing ends brought by mechanical fibrillation during WCNF preparation. Finally, the thermal stability of wood-based celluloses can be comparable to that of highly crystalline and pure bacterial cellulose after benzoylation at an optimum DS.