Bagasse hydrogels: water absorption and ions uptake

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to prepare and optimize the preparation conditions of some new hydrogels and in addition, evaluate their water absorbance at different mediums and their ability to remove ions from aqueous solutions.Design/methodology/approach – Cellulose was extracted from depithed bagasse at two different pulping conditions; 3 and 6 hours cooking times, pulp (I) and (II), respectively. These pulps, in addition to cotton linter for comparison, were grafted with acrylamide followed by cross‐linking with glutaraldehyde. The networks were partially hydrolyzed and the structures of products (before and after hydrolysis) were studied using FTIR, SEM, TGA and X‐ray. The optimum preparation conditions were identified, before and after hydrolysis, to achieve maximum absorbance and the ability of prepared hydrogels to remove ions from solutions was investigated.Findings – Maximum level of absorption was recorded using hydrogels prepared with monomer concentration =0.8 mol/l, cross‐linker con...