2.4.7.1 Water vapour transmission and water vapour permeability
2.4.7.2 Gas permeability
2.4.8 Water resistance
2.4.8.1 Water absorption capacity (Wa)
2.4.8.2 Water solubility (Ws)
2.4.8.3 Water contact angle
2.4.9 Migration tests
2.4.10 Food packaging tests
2.4.11 Soil burial tests
Chapter 3: Morphological, Mechanical and Thermal Properties of PVA/ HNT Bionanocomposite Films
3.1 Introduction
3.2 Morphological structures
3.2.1 SEM observation
3.2.2 AFM characterisation
3.3 Mechanical properties
3.4 Thermal properties
3.5 XRD analysis
3.6 FTIR analysis
3.7 UV-vis spectra
3.8 Summary
Chapter 4: Water Resistance and Biodegradation of PVA /HNT Bionanocomposite Films 4.1 Introduction
4.2 Water absorption capacity (Wa)
4.3 Water solubility (Ws)
4.4 Water contact angle
4.5 Soil burial biodegradation
4.6 SEM observation
4.7 Summary
Chapter 5: Barrier Properties of PVA/ HNT Bionanocomposite Films
5.1 Introduction
5.2 Water vapour transmission and water vapour permeability
5.2.1 Effect of temperature
5.2.2 Effect of RH gradient
5.3 Gas permeability
5.4 Comparison between experimental data and theoretical models
5.5 Summary
Chapter 6: Component Migration of PVA/HNT Bionanocomposite Films
6.1 Introduction
6.2 Overall migration rate
6.3 HNT migration rate
6.4 Packaging tests
6.5 Potential applications as food packaging materials 6.6. Summary
REFERENCES
APPENDICES
Zainab Waheed Abdullah is currently a PhD student at the School of Civil and Mechanical Engineering at Curtin University, Australia. She was previously an assistant lecturer at the Department of Material Engineering, Technical Engineering College-Baghdad, Middle Technical University, Iraq. Her wide-ranging research interests include bionanocomposites, biopolymers and materials characterisation, particularly for low cycle fatigue.
Dr. Yu Dong is a senior lecturer at the School of Civil and Mechanical Engineering, Curtin University, Australia. He has extensive research experience in the field of polymer nanocomposites, electrospun nanofibres, green composites, micromechanical modelling, nanomanufacturing and design of experiments. He is a lead book editor of "Manufacturing, Characterisation and Properties of Advanced Nanocomposites", MDPI, Switzerland, and "Fillers and Reinforcements for Advanced Nanocomposites", Elsevier, UK, and a sole book editor of "Nanostructures: Properties, Production Methods and Applications", NOVA Science Publishers, USA. He is also an associate editor of the journals “Frontiers in Materials” (Polymeric and Composite Materials section) and “Applied Nanoscience”.
This book focuses on the preparation and characterisation of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA)/ halloysite nanotube (HNT) bionanocomposite films with different HNT contents for potential use in food packaging. It examines the effect of material composition and nanofiller content on mechanical, thermal and optical properties in relation to their morphological structures, and also comprehensively describes the water resistance, biodegradation and migration rates of such bionanocomposites, as well as their barrier properties in terms of water vapour transmission, and water vapour, air and oxygen permeabilities. Further, this book discusses the use of Nielsen model and Cussler model to predict the relative permeability of bionanocomposites, demonstrating that Nielsen model is more effective and in better agreement with experimental data obtained. Lastly, it discusses the application of bionanocomposite films in food packaging to prolong the shelf life of freshly cut avocados and peaches.