Functionalized nanobacterial cellulose prepared by Qingneng Institute of Chinese Academy of Sciences

Researchers at the Qingdao Institute of Bioenergy and Process, Chinese Academy of Sciences, have developed a new method for the preparation of functionalized nanobacterial cellulose (BC). They used 6-carboxyfluorescein-modified glucose (6CF-Glc) as a substrate and used in situ fermentation of microorganisms to produce BC with unnaturally characteristic fluorescent functionality.

The method verified the feasibility of in situ synthesis of functional materials by microbial fermentation, realized the microbial synthesis of fluorescent functional cellulose materials, and successfully extended synthetic biology to the field of material functionalization. Compared with the functional materials obtained by the conventional modification method, the material obtained by the method has excellent performance.

The method has the advantages of green, low cost, controllable functional intensity and uniform distribution, and solves the bottleneck problem of the synthesis and performance of functional materials, and provides a new direction and ideas for the synthesis of functional BC materials by biological methods.

Nanobacterial cellulose is a cellulose material produced by microbial fermentation. It has a unique nanoporous fiber structure and has many advantages such as high crystallinity, high specific surface area, high degree of polymerization, excellent permeability, high porosity, and excellent mechanical properties. Functionalized bacterial cellulose has good application prospects in many fields such as chemical sensing, biological imaging, ultraviolet shielding, oil adsorption, fuel cells, biomedical materials, ion detection, and anti-counterfeiting labels. Currently, bacterial cellulose is functionalized primarily by physical coating or chemical modification. Physical coating conditions are mild, but functionalized modified molecules are susceptible to shedding. Chemically modified materials have poor performance, serious pollution, and difficult to scale production.