Ultrafiltration of Lignin – Valorization

The research is focused on fractionated kraft lignins and the potential use in different applications.Lignin as a second abundant biopolymer, is being produced in a large scale annually without any high value applications. It has a great structure, including aliphatic and aromatic groups with lots of active hydroxyl groups. One of the main obstacle which hinders lignin utilization is its heterogeneous structure after pulp procedure. In general, in order to utilize lignin in a sufficient way, structural analysis, separation and modification are necessary.In this term, for the first article, we tried to investigate and understand the construction of different structure of lignins in the different medias.In the second article, we focused mainly on the fractionation of lignoboost lignin by a ceramic membrane to understand the fouling phenomena. At the same time, low molecular weight lignin was separated to investigate the antioxidant activity of lignin.Recently, we are focusing on the design and synthesis of composite materials with having the porous properties for the different applications.The overall goal with the project is to valorize lignin as one major pulp production for the different application. Regarding this purpose, lignin should be cut off in a more homogeneous fractions and extra modification should be done to make it more active and efficient.