Green chemistry

The chemist Katalin Barta and her team have developed a method to produce polymers with promising properties from lignin. They could represent a climate-friendly alternative to petroleum-based plastics. Photo: Artjazz – stock.adobe.com

Researchers at the University of Graz develop bio-based polymers from paper industry waste

Every year, the paper industry produces around 50 million tonnes of lignin – a substance from the plant cell wall – as waste. Most of it is incinerated, some of it is used industrially, for example in the production of vanillin. As a renewable raw material, however, lignin still has a lot of potential that needs to be tapped. Katalin Barta, a chemist at the University of Graz, and her team have now developed an efficient catalytic method to produce polymers with promising properties from the waste product. These polymers could be suitable for a wide variety of high-tech materials, for example in the automotive industry, and represent a climate-friendly alternative to petroleum-based plastics. The research results were published in the journal Chem Catalysis.

"We succeeded in obtaining a special high-quality diamine from lignin mixtures, a nitrogen compound that plays an important role in industry," Katalin Barta reports. "We obtained this molecule via a series of catalytic processes and then used it to produce a promising class of polymers. Their properties suggest that they could serve as resistant plastics, with multiple applications, such as for car body parts," explains the chemist, whose research is funded by an ERC Starting Grant from the EU. The method is very efficient, ensures easy production and could eventually be applied on an industrial scale.

Publication
A Well-defined Diamine from Lignin Depolymerisation Mixtures for Constructing Bio-based Polybenzoxazines.
Xianyuan Wu, Maxim V. Galkin, Katalin Barta
Chem Catalysis, DOI 10.1016/j.checat.2021.10.022
www.cell.com/chem-catalysis/fulltext/S2667-1093(21)00287-6

Green chemistry
Katalin Barta's research focuses on sustainable methods, renewable raw materials and environmentally friendly reactions. This makes the chemist at the University of Graz part of the field of excellence "Climate Change Graz". Numerous publications attest to her successful work. A "green" method developed by her team for splitting wood into cellulose and lignin was published in the renowned journal Nature Communications in September 2021. Instead of organic solvents, which are CO₂-intensive and toxic, the chemist uses reusable alternative solvents from renewable resources. In addition to the environmental aspect, the method is also characterised by the high quality of the end products cellulose and lignin obtained with it.

Publication
Tunable and functional deep eutectic solvents for lignocellulose valorization.
Yongzhuang Liu, Noemi Deak, Zhiwen Wang, Haipeng Yu, Lisanne Hameleers, Edita Jurak, Peter J. Deuss & Katalin Barta
Nature Communications volume 12, Article number: 5424 (2021)
www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-25117-1

Gudrun Pichler

Related news

Electrifying: Researchers film the first moments on the way from light to electricity

Physicists at the University of Graz (Austria), in collaboration with colleagues from Marburg University and Forschungszentrum Jülich (Germany), have achieved a scientific breakthrough. For the first time, the generation of electrical energy from light has been filmed and described theoretically. This work is of far-reaching significance, not least for optimising sustainable energy production from photovoltaics. This is because it provides fundamental building blocks for understanding the physical processes that take place, for example, in organic solar cells. The paper was published in the journal Physical Review X, one of the world’s most prestigious physics journals.

University of Graz: Working together to make Styria a sustainable centre of learning

Round table calls for sustainable funding for the 2028–2030 performance agreement period between the five Styrian universities and the federal government.

How can we teach using YouTube and AI? The University of Graz is strengthening media education in schools

A journey through the blood vessels using VR headsets brings biology lessons to life. An interactive quiz brings physics to life. The YouTube video explains the First World War. Whilst mobile phones are increasingly being banned from the classroom, social media platforms, apps and AI are playing an ever-greater role in knowledge transfer at school. But how can teaching with media be made even more effective? What are the challenges in media-based teaching? At the University of Graz, researchers are discussing these issues at a conference being held in Austria for the first time.

Jurassic Sounds: Biologist reconstructs insect songs from 165 million years ago

It was apparently not just the roars of the dinosaurs that made up the soundscape of the animal world during the Jurassic period. Crickets and grasshoppers communicated through a variety of songs and high-pitched sounds, as Thorin Jonsson from the Institute of Biology at the University of Graz discovered together with colleagues from the universities of Lincoln, Bristol (UK), Beijing (China) and Tempe (USA). The findings on what are so far the oldest traces of sound on Earth have just been published in the journal PNAS.