Chemical Treatments of Cotton Linter Cellulose Fiber for Composite Application

In the present research work, cellulose fiber was isolated from cotton linter (CL) collected from local textile mills of Kushtia district, Bangladesh. To remove dirt and impurities, CL was pre-treated with NaOH and NaClO2. Fiber was treated with a number of chemicals such as dicumyl peroxide (DCP), acetic anhydride (AA) and acrylamide (AAm). The changes of cellulose molecules during the chemical treatments were detected by FTIR spectra. The crystallinity index of pretreated and treated fibers were measured from the peaks at 14.6 and 22.6 (2θ angles) of WAXD curves. The proportion of crystalline part was increased in case of treated cellulose fiber, which manifests significant conversion of cellulose-I to cellulose-II. A significant variation of thermal properties of pretreated and treated fibers were also observed by TGA.