Bonding improvement of three times recovered Kraft fibers through coating of chitosan/carboxyl methyl cellulose multilayers

Paper recycling has been greatly developed as a suitable approach to use waste paper and as a huge source of cellulose fibers in recent years. Regarding to the structural characteristics of these fibers, which differ largely from those virgin fibers; the first and most important challenge of their application is to modify them for reusing in papermaking industry. It seems that if these fibers are repeatedly used, their applicability will reduce. Although the impact of recycling number for these type of fibers on the paper properties has always been taken into consideration, but there are not many reports available in the literature review. Recent studies show that layer-by-layer technique is a good way for modifying the cellulose fibers characteristics and improving its quality. In this technique, cellulosic fibers and counter-ionic particles are placed in an interaction media. During the interaction, ionic particles are absorbed by fibers surface mainly via electrostatic absorption. Thus, the fibers network strength would improve considerably. Therefore, in current study, the Kraft paper recovered three times at first. The possibility of modifying of three times recovered Kraft fibers has been investigated using layer-by-layer technique in order to develop the bonding potential of the fibers. Kraft fibers were first recycled three times. Then, the three times recycled fibers were treated by 1 % cationic chitosan and 1 % anionic carboxyl methyl cellulose (CMC), based on the oven dry (OD) weight of fibers, by using layer-by-layer method. The treatment was applied to form one, two and three double layers of pair polymers on the fiber surface. To form a consecutive double layers, 500 ml of fiber suspension with consistency of about 0.6 % was mixed with chitosan and CMC solutions for 10 minutes by using dynamic drainage jar (DDJ) machine. Paper sheets with base weight of about 80±5 g/m2 were prepared from the pulp samples and their characteristics were evaluated according to TAPPI standard methods. In addition, SEM micrographs were prepared from the papers to evaluate the changes in the structure of the fiber surface. The alternate variation of zeta potential confirmed the formation of chitosan and CMC layers on the surface of Kraft recycled fibers. The evaluation of paper strengths showed that the fibers bonding has been developed by treating the three times recycled Kraft fibers with layer-by-layer method, through absorbing of these two strength-enhancing polymers. Meanwhile, paper apparent density, tensile index, internal bonding, and tensile energy absorption have significantly increased. However, the bending stiffness of the paper has shown a significant decrease due to the increased in paper density (decrease in thickness). In addition, based on SEM results there was a clear difference between the surface of treated and untreated fibers, which indicated the absorption of polymers, leading to the development of bonds between the fibers, and paper strength. It can be concluded that it is possible to modify the bonding-ability of three times recycled Kraft fibers by using layer-by-layer technique. This method can be applied to assemble multilayers of chitosan and CMC polymers on the fiber surfaces, to improve the strength properties of the resulting paper.