Lignin nanoparticle reinforced multifunctional polyvinyl alcohol/polyurethane composite hydrogel with excellent mechanical, UV-blocking, rheological and thermal properties

In this study, we innovatively synthesized a multifunctional PVA/PU-LNP composite hydrogel with integrated distinguished UV-blocking, mechanical strength, dynamic viscoelasticity and thermal properties by introducing lignin nanoparticle (LNP) into polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and polyurethane (PU) mixed matrix through freeze-thaw cycle. The rigid porous network structure was established by hydrogen bond interactions among the well-distributed LNP and PVA/PU molecular chains, which endowed excellent mechanical strength, viscoelasticity, thermal stability and flexibility with PVA/PU-LNP composite hydrogel. The elongation at break and tensile strength of PVA/PU-LNP composite hydrogel were markedly improved from 227.3 % and 247.1 KPa to 460.1 % and 950.4 KPa with the LNP loading of 2 % based on PVA weight, respectively. Meanwhile, PVA/PU-2%LNP hydrogel exhibited prominent compressive resistance and pleasing shape recovery capability. Moreover, the blending of LNP at a low dosage (0.5 %) based on PVA weight effectively shielded 99.34 % of UV light and penetrated 42.27 % of visible light, indicating that PVA/PU-LNP composite hydrogel demonstrated outstanding anti-UV performance. In addition, the incorporation of LNP caused a remarkable decline in the pore size of PVA/PU-LNP composite hydrogel (4.39 ± 0.46 μm to 1.54 ± 0.22 μm), which slightly reduced water uptake capacity of composite hydrogel. Therefore, this work provided a new approach to constructing a multifunctional composite hydrogel.