Separation and Dissolving of Cellulose from Wheat Straw Using Aqueous Solution: A Topochemistry Investigation

Biomass such as wheat straw is a resource of cellulose while the separation of cellulose from it is still a big challenge today. In this study, wheat straw was prehydrolyzed by HCI acid at first followed by delignification and bleaching processes to isolate cellulose from the straw. The topochemistry of the straws treated at different stages has been investigated by means of SEM-EDX, FT-IR and XRD measurements. The results revealed that the removing of hemicelluloses at first by acid could damage the complex structure of straw and make it easy to remove lignin. After bleaching cellulose is obtained and it could be directly dissolved in LiOH/urea aqueous solution through a precooling-thaw process, which provides a process to utilize aqueous solution in both the separation and dissolving cellulose from wheat straw.