Advances in Aqueous Cellulose Solvents

Cellulose is an almost inexhaustible source of raw material for the increasing demand for biodegradable products, and its solvent is a key for the research and developments. This chapter summarizes the aqueous cellulose solvents, such as NaOH aqueous, NaOH/urea aqueous, NaOH/thiourea aqueous and LiON/urea aqueous systems with cooling. The dissolution mechanism, solution behaviors, preparation and modifications of the various cellulose materials, as well as their properties and applications were described. The dissolution of cellulose in pre-cooled aqueous solution deals with the formation of new hydrogen-bonded networks between cellulose and solvent molecules, which is at a highly stable state at low temperatures. The aqueous cellulose solvents are simple and low cost, and the preparation method of the cellulose products from the cellulose solution are short production cycle and “green” process. The potential applications of the cellulose fibers, films, hydrogels, microspheres and functional composite materials created from the aqueous cellulose solution were also discussed in this section.