6 research outputs found
Soy-Protein-Based Nanofabrics for Highly Efficient and Multifunctional Air Filtration
Proteins
are well-known by their numerous active functional groups
along the polypeptide chain. The variety of functional groups of proteins
provides a great potential for proteins to interact with airborne
pollutants with varying surface properties. However, to our knowledge,
a successful demonstration of this potential has not been reported
before. In this work, soy protein, a type of abundant plant protein,
has been employed for the first time to fabricate multifunctional
air-filtration materials. To take advantage of the functional groups
of soy protein for air filtration, the soy protein was first well
denatured to unfold the polypeptide chains and then fabricated into
nanofibers with the help of poly(vinyl alcohol). It was found that
the resultant nanofabrics showed high filtration efficiency not only
for airborne particulates with a broad range of size but also for
various toxic gaseous chemicals (e.g., formaldehyde and carbon monoxide),
a capability that has not been realized by conventional air-filtering
materials. This study indicates that protein-based nanofabrics are
promising nanomaterials for multifunctional air-filtration applications