Bio-inspired Coatings with Advanced Properties from Natural Resources

Project Aims:
The objective is the development of bio-based & bio-inspired functional coatings with advanced properties (e.g., adhesion, gas barrier, superhydrophobicity or oil repellency) for applications ranging from packaging or microencapsulation of active substances to self-cleaning surfaces. Widely available biomass materials, e.g., (nano)cellulose, (nano)lignin, (nano)chitin, in combination with other natural ingredients such as gums, proteins, peptides, inorganic (nano)particles, fatty acids, or waxes will be utilised and following Nature's hierarchical designs, I will modify & combine these individual building blocks into supramolecular assemblies that achieve the desired properties for the target applications. The molecular & supramolecular designs will be assisted by multiscale computational modeling, ranging from density functional theory (DFT) calculations to full-atomistic & coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations. The data generated with these computational methods can be used to train machine learning models that will accelerate materials discovery and property predictions. Within the concept of circular economy, the new formulations will be based on natural ingredients, or compounds that could be obtained from the agrifood industry (an area in which AINIA has extensive expertise), & I will aim at materials that can be intrinsically designed for degradation, i.e., circularity by design. To achieve adequate properties for the target applications, while complying with natural principles of circularity and performance, we will initially consider lignocellulosic derivatives (e.g., microfibers of cellulose, nanolignin) as the core components of the coatings. These lignocellulosic derivatives can be used as received or after undergoing additional functionalization, following computational designs, or rational intuition.