Fabrication of flexible composite film based on xylan from pulping process for packaging application.

To realize the application of xylan based film in food and drug packaging, the poor mechanical property and film-forming property of xylan based film must be overcome. Herein, a good oxygen barrier composite film with desired mechanical properties was prepared based on carboxymethly xylan (CMX), chitosan (CS), and graphene oxide (GO). The results of scanning electron microscope revealed the composite film had a dense and continuous structure, which will endow the composite film with excellent mechanical property. As expected, the composite film with the 0.5% mass fraction of GO exhibited best mechanical property, among which the tensile stress, tensile strain, and Young's modulus of the composite film reached 50.81 MPa, 47.61%, and 1.39 GPa, respectively. The oxygen barrier properties of the composite films significantly increased with the addition of graphene oxide due to the dense, stacked multilayer structure. In addition, these composite films exhibited good antibacterial properties. Therefore, these films show great promise in the field of food packaging and wound dressing due to their excellent mechanical, oxygen barrier and antibacterial properties. • Flexible composite films based on CMX, CS, and GO prepared by casting method. • Desired mechanical properties of the composite films were obtained by adding GO. • The composite films exhibit good oxygen barrier and antibacterial properties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]