Valorization of Biomass

Because of its natural abundance, lignocellulosic biomass is being widely investigated as a renewable feedstock that could serve as an alternative to petroleum-derived chemicals. Although significant advances in its utilization have been developed, there remains great opportunity in the valorization of renewable biomass to create value-added materials. One approach to achieve this goal is in the use of tailoring polymer chemistry to create high-value polymeric materials from biomass sources.

An area of emphasis in the Epps group is the synthesis of functionalized monomers from these renewable feedstocks, with a particular focus on lignin-derived compounds. Lignin can be depolymerized into its building blocks, which can then be modified to create monomers for the synthesis of new materials through controlled radical, ring-opening, anionic, and cationic polymerizations. Additionally, inherent functionalities on lignin aromatics can be helpful to mitigate the toxicity concerns of conventional aromatics. Of particular interest to our group is developing structure-property relationships of these materials and investigating ways to valorize biomass feedstocks such as making biobased monomers for 3D printing, generating lignin-derived steric stabilizers for fabrication of sustainable MOF/polymer composites, and using bio-based catalysts for synthesizing components of sustainable thermoset-forming systems.