Investigation on the interaction mechanism between nanocellulose and adhesion RH

A complex of resorcinol and hexamethylenetetramine (RH) was utilized to modify nanocellulose (NCC) using in-suit solution method, where NCC was extracted from eucalyptus pulp paper with ultrasonic oxidation steps. The modified NCC was then put into vulcanized condition to simulate vulcanization process of rubber; the product was called vulcanized RH-NCC model compound. In this paper, we study whether vulcanized conditions have influence on the interaction between RH and NCC by comparing changes of RH-NCC model compounds before and after vulcanization. The analysis of thermogravimetry (TG), X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), and water contact angle shows that addition of RH can improve some properties of NCC, which demonstrates well interaction between them. Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) test shows that there are no big changes before vulcanization; however, after simulated vulcanization, characteristic peaks of compound have changed a lot, illustrating that some chemical reactions have occurred. Further research on data from fitting peaks of hydrogen bonds and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) analysis found that before vulcanization, mechanism between RH and NCC was mainly physical hydrogen interaction, and chemical interaction mechanism was also put forward after vulcanization.