I am working with large amounts of pulp (in blocks, like reams of paper) and need to solubilize it without grinding.
I tried some organic solvents and solvent mixtures for solubilization, but I could only see the swelling of some surface sheets of cellulose (which is a good thing, but the full swelling of the sheet would be better).
I thought of using large amounts of acid, but it could make my project unfeasible.
Would you have any ideas?
Thank you in advance if you can help me.
The below mentioned researcher has many articles involving cellulose, pulp, and paper relevant to your question. Look specially at the older articles. Happy new year.
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Yehia_Fahmy
Dear Flavio,
How dense is your block? I think you may have to break it or chip it to smaller units to enable better accessiblity of the hydrolyzing agent to the cellulose units. Have you assessed the composition of your block? What quantity of other components does it have (lignin, hemicelluse, etc.,) ? When I worked with paper-mesh blocks, a stage of steam hydrolysis (I roughly broke them to 2 cu.cm pieces) helped it swell; Later, I used a stipulated quantity of cellulase to completely convert it to a dense solution.
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