Regenerated isotropic wood

Construction of sustainable high-performance structural materials is a core part of the key global sustainability goal. Many efforts have been made in this field; however, challenges remain in terms of lowering costs by using all-green basic building blocks and improving mechanical properties to meet the demand of practical applications. Here, we report a robust and efficient bottom-up strategy with micro/nanoscale structure design to regenerate an isotropic wood from natural wood particles as a high-performance sustainable structural material. Regenerated isotropic wood (RGI-wood) exceeds the limitations of the anisotropic and inconsistent mechanical properties of natural wood, having isotropic flexural strength of similar to 170 MPa and flexural modulus of similar to 10 GPa. RGI-wood also shows superior water resistance and fire retardancy properties to natural pine wood. Mass production of large sized RGI-wood and functional RGI-wood nanocomposites can also be achieved.