| 1. |
- Jiang, Wen, 1990-
(författare)
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Acid-catalyzed Liquefaction of Industrial Side-streams for Producing Wood Adhesives and Particleboard
- 2022
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Big quantities of residues and side-streams are generated annually from forest-based and agricultural industries all around the world and present a relatively unexplored renewable resource. Due to the absence of a regularly updated and systematic database of supply, industrial residues and side-streams usually end up in landfill disposal, are used for energy generation, or remain at the production sites. These renewable side-streams are mainly lignocellulosic materials that can be used for fuels, chemicals, and other value-added materials. However, the difficulty in recovering useful components from industrial wastes from a techno-economic point of view is hindering the use of these materials. There are different methods for converting biomass into fuels, chemicals, and materials, including thermochemical, biochemical, and physical conversion. Negative environmental impacts from direct incineration of waste materials and increasing interest in reducing the dependency on fossil-based sources have increased the need for the valorization of the industrial side-streams for material and chemical applications. Among the different thermochemical conversion methods, liquefaction of lignocellulosic materials is an efficient way to convert solid biomass into liquids. Liquefaction including hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) and moderate acid-catalyzed liquefaction (MACL), is often carried out in an aqueous environment by employing organic solvents with or without catalyst under pressure or ambient conditions. A liquefaction process is influenced by many factors such as material type, solvent, catalyst, time, and temperature. All the parameters of the liquefaction are related to each other, and they affect the yields and the properties of the final products. Studies on the utilization of industrial waste and side-streams as feedstock for liquefaction have increased in recent years, generating significant interest from both academia and industry. This PhD study included a literature review on liquefaction technologies that provide liquefied products for wood adhesives, followed by experimental work on MACL and its optimization for different industrial side-streams, such as wood sawdust, bark, and oat husks. Liquefaction of those materials led to different liquefaction yields (LY) due to their different chemical compositions. When the same liquefaction conditions were applied, liquefied wood sawdust had the highest LY while liquefied bark had the lowest. This was mainly attributed to wood sawdust having a higher cellulose and lower lignin content, when compared to bark and oat husks. After optimizing the liquefaction of wood sawdust, obtained products were applied in wood adhesive formulations successfully. Crude liquefied wood (CLW) and purified liquefied wood (PLW) polyols were obtained from the liquefaction of wood sawdust with the highest LY of 99.7% and used for the synthesis of polyurethane (PU) adhesives by reacting them with polymeric diphenylmethane diisocyanate (pMDI). The bonding strength and penetration to wood adherends of the PU adhesives were affected by the molar ratios between the isocyanate groups (NCO) in pMDI and the hydroxyl groups (OH) in the CLW and PLW. The highest bonding strength of PU adhesives was achieved at an NCO:OH molar ratio of 1.5:1. The thermal stability of the PU adhesives was improved by increasing the NCO:OH molar ratio. PU adhesives based on CLW and PLW with the same adhesive formulation did not show significant differences in their properties while CLW polyol contained more water and alcohols than PLW. A novel method called partial liquefaction of lignocellulosic biomass was also proposed. Partially liquefied bark (PLB) was prepared and used to replace wood particles for producing particleboards (PB) with or without the presence of a commercial synthetic adhesive, i.e. melamine-urea-formaldehyde (MUF). PLB was shown to provide single-layer PBs with good adhesion, mechanical strength, and water repellency. The overall mechanical properties of non-MUF single-layer PBs were inferior to those of MUF-bonded PBs. Increasing the PLB content up to 9.5% led to enhanced mechanical properties for MUF-bonded PBs. PLB prepared from bark with a particle size less than 2 mm ensured good mechanical behavior of single-layer PBs. Moreover, three-layer particleboards prepared from PLB and wood particles had comparable mechanical properties to the reference PBs made solely from wood particles, and PLB had less influence on the mechanical properties of the PBs when used in the surface layer than in the core layer. Formaldehyde emissions from the three-layer PBs were below the limits required by European Standard EN 13986:2004 and major volatile organic compounds (VOCs) were carboxylic acids. This research provided a comprehensive understanding of converting different lignocellulosic materials by a MACL process into valuable polymers and raw materials, which are suitable for the synthesis of wood adhesives and for the manufacturing of particleboards. Due to time constraints related to conducting the PhD, it was not possible to conduct a full characterization of the liquefied products from the selected materials. Such studies should be part of future research in order to supplement our knowledge of MACL mechanisms.
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| 2. |
- Jones, Grace
(författare)
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Birch Stem and Wood Traits in Genetic and Silviculture Trials in Southern Sweden
- 2022
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Swedish tree species of birch (silver: Betula pendula and downy: B. pubescens) are often neglected during forest management activities, resulting in low value logs. This thesis investigated birch stem characteristics and wood properties important for solid wood products, in genetics and management trials in southern Sweden. As well as visual stem size and form measurements, non-destructive testing and evaluation (NDT) tools were used to indirectly estimate wood density (hardness), wood stiffness, and grain angle.The results of this work suggest that for the 19-year-old silver birch and 15-year-old downy birch sites, important solid wood traits were under a reasonable degree of genetic control. It seems possible to breed birch to improve grain angle since heritability and genetic variation was high for this trait. Silver birch genotypes are expected to perform similarly across sites. At a site with both birch species, silver birch was larger with denser wood than downy birch. Few genetic correlations between measurements means selection for one trait will not inadvertently affect another trait. The radial density profiles showed density was continuing to increase. Acoustic velocity (AV) and fibre length were highly correlated, hardness and density were related, and ring width was related to ring density. In a 35-year-old planted Norway spruce stand, naturally regenerated birch AV was not different between treatments (20% or 50% of plot trees were birch by number). However, a correlation was observed between DBH and AV. This older site may reflect common Swedish conditions since planting birch is rare, and likely had more mature birch wood than the genetics trials. Although meeting an immediate need for studies of birch wood properties from managed stands, this work covered few sites. To meet this limitation the tools and techniques applied in this thesis could be used in further studies. The results of this thesis work will be of interest to forest managers who want to breed birch, or select birch stands, for solid wood products.
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| 3. |
- Kovacikova, Janka, et al.
(författare)
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Mechanical properties of fiberboard composite bonded with polymer matrixcomputed by mean-field homogenization methods
- 2021
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Ingår i: 25th International Congress of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics, August 22-27, 2021. - Milano, Italy. - 9788365550316 ; , s. 1984-1985
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Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Nowadays, the design of composite materials considering sustainability and the environmental impact of the production is conspicuous. Therefore, in this work, we focus on investigating the mechanical behaviour and structure of a new green wood-based fibrous composite material bonded with a novel polymer matrix. The constitutive prediction models employing the material and structure design approaches simultaneously are proposed here to describe the material's microstructure. The goal is speeding up trials and reducing experiments expenses by replacing tests with computer simulations. Additionally, the relationship between material behaviour and structure is established and will be later used to generate Representative Volume Elements (RVEs) for finite element analysis (FEA).
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| 4. |
- van Blokland, Joran
(författare)
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Thermally Modified Timber : Novel Aspects of Bending Behaviour Towards Grading and Structural Applications
- 2020
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Thermally modified timber (TMT) has gained market share in Europe as an environmentally friendly and durable building material. Unfortunately, TMT products are currently prohibited for use in structural applications as there is insufficient data to estimate the loss in strength due to thermal modification. This thesis work explored the fundamentals related to the static 4-point bending (4PB) behaviour of TMT needed to expand its use in the construction sector.The effect of treatment on checks in and around knots, and their combined effect on the 4PB behaviour of TMT, was studied with digital image correlation on 9 Norway spruce boards. For 190 matched board pairs of Norway spruce, one board was modified according to the ThermoWood® Thermo-D process, and the other remained untreated for comparison. One-hundred (100) board pairs were used to assess the effect of treatment on the 4PB properties and behaviour, and on indicating properties (IPs): density, longitudinal resonance and ultrasonic wave speed. The remaining 90 board pairs were weathered for 30 months to evaluate differences in the degree of checking, the IPs and the 4PB properties and behaviour. Fibre angle was measured on all board surfaces using a WoodEye 5 high-resolution laser scanner to study the location of failure in TMT, and to potentially improve bending strength predictions.Thermal modification decreased the bending strength by approximately 40%; however, the presence of knots still determined the type and location of failure. Thermal modification and weathering play a critical role in the formation of severe checks in timber, but their presence had no significant influence on the bending properties. TMT could be graded using acoustic-type grading machines already available at most sawmills, and these principles could be applied to predict the presence of internal checks. Scanning the fibre direction improved strength predictions of TMT and enabled the failure location to be predicted. Grading timber before thermal modification could reduce the rejection rate of TMT if manufacturers select raw material that is resistant to internal checking and is of a suitable grade.
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