Cotton Cellulose: Perfect Precursor for Bioproducts Development.

Cellulose is the most abundant natural polymer on earth.  Cotton fiber is composed of 95% of cellulose after scouring and bleaching. The dissolution of cellulose represents the first key step for most applications of cellulose and it is highly affected by the degree of polymerization (DP) of cellulose. Due to the high DP (9000-15000), the dissolution of cellulose is difficult to achieve under a relatively mild conditions.

Cellulose is a very stable polymer as it plays a crucial role in the structural soundness of plants.  This stability makes it particularly difficult to deconstruct.  The degree of insolubility of cellulose is due to its chemical and physical structure.  In order for dissolution to occur, a solvent must be able to insert itself between microfibrils and cellulose chains. The extent of the use of cellulose to develop an economically sustainable renewable bioproducts industry is limited due to its inefficient and incomplete dissolution in most common solvents. In this paper, we report on the dissolution of cellulose in three solvent systems: NaOH/urea, DMAC/LiCl and 3-butyl 1-immidazolum chloride ionic liquid (BmimCl)).