Poultry feathers are low cost, abundant bioderived materials that are often regarded as waste. In this work, we report a simple method akin to papermaking to upcycle whole poultry feather waste into nonwoven whole feather preforms. This was achieved by utilizing (nano)cellulose fibers, namely, wood pulp and nanocellulose, as binders. It was found that the hornification between adjacent (nano)cellulose fibers trapped and held the whole poultry feathers together, producing a rigid and robust nonwoven whole feather preform. The preforms containing nanocellulose were found to perform better mechanically, with a tensile strength of up to 1.6 N mm⁻¹ (at 20 wt % nanocellulose content), compared to preforms containing wood pulp. Feather–gelatin composites containing 23 and 47 wt % nonwoven whole feather preform loadings were also successfully manufactured. The resulting composites possessed a tensile modulus and strength up to 2.1 GPa and 18 MPa, respectively. This work also shows that the feather–gelatin composites could be easily deconstructed in hot water. The produced nonwoven whole feather preforms, as well as their feather–gelatin composites, could serve as a sustainable alternative for various semistructural applications, in line with the concept of a circular bioeconomy.

中文翻译：

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（Nano）纤维素升级家禽羽毛：非织造整体羽毛预成型坯衍生的可持续复合材料

家禽羽毛是低成本的，生物来源丰富的材料，通常被视为废物。在这项工作中，我们报告了一种类似于造纸的简单方法，可以将整个家禽羽毛废料升级为非织造全羽毛预制件。这是通过利用（纳米）纤维素纤维，即木浆和纳米纤维素作为粘合剂来实现的。发现相邻（纳米）纤维素纤维之间的角化将整个家禽羽毛束缚并保持在一起，从而生产出坚硬而结实的非织造全羽毛预制件。发现含有纳米纤维素的预成型坯在机械性能方面表现更好，拉伸强度高达1.6 N mm ^-1（含有20 wt％的纳米纤维素含量），与含有木浆的预成型坯相比。还成功制造了包含23％和47％重量的非织造全羽毛预成型坯的羽毛-明胶复合材料。所得复合材料的拉伸模量和强度分别高达2.1 GPa和18 MPa。这项工作还表明，羽毛-明胶复合材料很容易在热水中解构。所生产的非织造全羽毛预成型件以及它们的羽毛-明胶复合材料，可以根据循环生物经济的概念，作为各种半结构应用的可持续替代品。