Recycling textiles: the use of ionic liquids in the separation of cotton polyester blends. A facile and environmentally sustainable solution.

Herein we investigate the stabilization behavior of a cellulose-lignin composite fibre towards application as a new bio derived precursor for carbon fibres. Carbon fibre materials are in high demand as we move towards a lower emission high-efficiency society. However, the most prominent current carbon fibre precursor is an expensive fossil-based polymer. Over the past decade significant research has focused on using renewable and bio derived alternatives. By blending cellulose and lignin and spinning a fibre with a continuous bi-component matrix a new approach to overcome the current limitations of both these precursors is proposed. A thorough study is conducted here on understanding the stabilization of the new precursors which is a critical step in the carbon fibre process. We show that stabilization times of the composite fibre are significantly reduced in comparison to pure lignin and improvements in mass yield compared to pure cellulose fibres are observed.

We have studied the impact of ionic liquid solvents on the structure of the Abeta(1–40) peptide from Alzheimer's disease and found that ionic liquid solvents were able to induce a conformational change in the structure of the Abeta(1–40) peptide. This conformational change impacts the self-assembly of the peptide into amyloid fibrils.

We have shown that protic ionic liquids, pILs, are effective coagulation solvents for the regenerated of silk fibroin, RSF. We show that the choice of pIL has a dramatic effect on the composition of the RSF. Additionally the use of pILs as the coagulator eliminates the need for volatile organic solvents in silk processing.

We have shown that the amyloid fibrilization of Aβ16-22 follows a reverse hofmeister trend in pILs. Fast fibrilization rates of seconds can be achieved.