The effect of bacterial cellulose as an additive on filler retention in paper production

In paper production, which is the most consumed material in the world, with the developing printing technology, the demands to improve the whiteness, printing quality and surface smoothness of the paper have increased rapidly and fillers have started to be used widely for this purpose. The positive properties of CaCO3 which is the most preferred, hve been further developed by various methods. The high quality papers with high whiteness, brightness and opacity were produced with the developed synthetic (precipitated) calcium carbonates (PCC): but the use of various chemicals were inevitable to ensure adhesion in cellulose fibers due to their small particle sizes. Bacterial cellulose (BS) which has been increasingly used in many different industrial areas and has many superior properties compared to plant cellulose such as purity, elasticity and reticulate structure was produced by fermentation from yeast-bacteria kombucha culture (SCOBY) in this study. The bonding activity of bacterial cellulose (BS) for preciritated carbonate (PCC) in bleached chemical pulp was investigated alone and with cationic polyacrylamide (CPAM) as an additional retention agent. For this purpose, the BC used in this study was 5%, 10% and 15%, PCC 30% and CPAM 0.02% and 0.04% for the filtred water. The methods of determining the absorbance of the filtrated water and the amount of inorganic material in the produced paper were used to determine the retention. In addition the mechanical and physical properties of the papers were determined. The highest retention was achieved with a single use of cationic polyacrylamide (CPAM) as retention agent. It has been determined that using BC has a limited effect on calcium carbonate retention with a single use but increases strenght properties. It has been concluded that resistance losses caused by filler retention can be prevented by BC effect and BC is sufficient for this. With the addition of BC, the air and water permeability decreased with the addition of filer and retention of it.