Renewable Bioproducts Institute at TAPPINano 2024

Faculty and students of the Georgia Tech Renewable Bioproducts Institute (RBI) were active participants at the TAPPINano 2024 conference held in Atlanta on June 10-14. The Renewable Bioproducts Institute was a gold sponsor of the annual event that focused on the topic - Building from the Bottom Up: Shaping a Sustainable World using Renewable Nanomaterials.

RBI’s Executive Director Carson Meredith was a keynote speaker at the conference and Meisha Shofner, professor in the School of Materials Science and Engineering served as the conference chair. Conference attendees had an opportunity to participate in an academic tour of RBI that included a tour of the Robert C. Williams Museum of Papermaking, located within the Renewable Bioproducts Institute. 

During a session on water treatment and recovery, Zhaohui Tong, associate professor and RBI initiative lead for Waste Valorization in Food-Energy-Water and Yongsheng Chen, Bonnie W. and Charles W. Moorman IV professor in the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering participated and presented their work on nano-triboelectric cellulose membrane sensors for heavy metal ions removal and detection and next generation nano filtration membranes via machine learning-screened novel monomers respectively.

During the lunch presentation on June 11, Meredith presented his keynote on the topic “Cellulose nano materials at the Renewable Bioproducts Institute: Two decades of partnerships and progress.”

Xiaoqing Yu, graduate student at the Woodruff School presented her paper on de-wrinkling for papers coated with cellulose nanocrystal and modified celluloses.

Georgia Tech graduate students and RBI Fellows, Kim Anh Pham, Jonathan Rhone and Javaz Rolle participated in a session on cellulose based coatings, and presented their work on sustainable oxygen barrier coatings for paper based on anionic and cationic cellulose derived materials, cellulose nanocrystal coated glass fiber-epoxy composites: interfacial and tensile properties, and durable bio-based coatings for packaging applications.

Finally, during a session on CNF & MFC Sheets and Films, Fariha Rubaiya, RBI Fellow presented her work on out-of-plane auxecity in cellulose nanofibril films.

Here is a video shared by the TAPPINano 2024 organizers on the highlights of the conference.