IMX Seminar Series - Cellulose nanofibers as building blocks for functional materials

Within the last twenty years a tremendous progress has been made in the more eco-friendly production of cellulose nanofibers (CNF), their chemical surface modification and use as building blocks in dense, soft, and porous systems for the development of functional materials. Depending on the envisaged application, the inherent properties of CNF such as e.g. biodegradability, renewability, high surface area, high strength and stiffness at low density, or thermal expansion have been exploited for polymer composite, paper and packaging, electronic, filtering, cosmetic, automotive, or bio-medical applications. Moreover, emerging technologies like the direct ink writing or other 3D printing techniques have been more and more exploited for the production of 3D architectures with CNF as building blocks. In this context the development of viscoelastic inks is of utmost importance. The shear-induced alignment of CNF leads to textured anisotropic materials where structures and mechanical properties can be controlled.
The presentation will give an overview on cellulose based material developments at Empa in Switzerland over the last two decades.
Bio: Tanja Zimmermann is Director of Empa and Professor of Materials Science at ETH Zurich and EPF Lausanne. She received her PhD from the University of Hamburg in 2007 for her research that provided the basis for technical applications of cellulose. Between 2001 and 2012, she established the research field of cellulose nanocomposites both at Empa and in Switzerland. From 2011 to 2017, she was head of Empa's laboratory for Applied Wood Materials; since fall 2017, she has been a member of the institute's directorate and head of the department Functional Materials with six research units dealing with a multitude of materials, ranging from wood- and cellulose-based materials to concrete and asphalt, high-performance ceramics and polymer fibers, as well as materials and components for energy applications. At the same time, she took over the co-leadership of the Research Focus Area Sustainable Built Environment, in which topics such as circular economy, resource efficiency and the successful implementation of the Swiss energy strategy play a central role. In the last three years, she and her colleagues have also established computer- and data-based materials science and – in cooperation with the Imperial College London – the Materials and Technology Centre of Robotics at Empa.