Corn Stalk Fiber-Based Biomass Brick Reinforced by Compact Organic/Inorganic Calcification Composites

Biomass brick is green, reproducible and environment-friendly material with broad market prospects. In this work, corn stalk fiber-based biomass bricks are molded with calcium hydroxide (Ca(OH)(2)) as the adhesive in order to increase the strength of bricks. Because of the strong basicity of Ca(OH)(2), corn stalk fiber was partially, incompletely degraded during the process of cold press and hot air drying, resulting in the formation of compact organic/inorganic composites. The hydrogen bond between cellulose and hemicellulose is weakened, the ester bond between hemicellulose and lignin is saponified, and the ether bond of lignin is broken, resulting in that the structure of fiber is destroyed, and facilitating the generation of organic/inorganic composites. The results of a series of tests, including scanning electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction, infrared spectroscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance and so on, confirmed a desired change in structure of the fibers and the formation of composites. Furthermore, this composite structure significantly improved the strength of the brick.