Cellulose Source Tailors the Physical and Structural Properties of Double-Functionalized Aerogels

Cellulose aerogels are solid materials with high porosity, low density, and large surface area, and show excellent absorption of mechanical stress. These characteristics are appropriate for the development of new high-value products. However, over the years, it has been increasingly difficult to compare different studies about this material due to the different approaches used. In the present work, three different raw materials, bacterial cellulose from synthetic medium (BC), bacterial cellulose from cashew juice permeate (BCP), and eucalyptus nanocellulose (EC) were double-functionalized with TEMPO oxidation followed by silanization and freeze-dried, resulting in three different types of cellulose aerogels. These aerogels were evaluated for their performance in the absorption of organic oils/solvents and mechanical properties. The raw materials lead to aerogels with different characteristics. BC aerogel has the best mechanical properties and absorption capacity after 7 cycles; BCP aerogel presented the highest values for oil absorption and EC aerogel for organic solvent absorption.