Corn Husk

Fiber reinforced polymer composites has been used in a variety of application as class of structure material because of their many advantages such as relatively low cost of production, easy to fabricate and superior strength compare to neat polymer resins. Reinforcement in polymer is either synthetic or natural. Synthetic fiber such as glass, carbon etc. has high specific strength but their fields of application are limited due to higher cost of production. Recently there is an increase interest in natural composites which are made by reinforcement of natural fiber. Because the natural fiber give good property at lower cost of production In this connection an investigation have been carried out to make better utilization of coconut coir fiber which is very cheaply and easily found in India. The objective of the present research work to study the mechanical properties of coconut coir reinforced with epoxy composites. The effect of fiber loading and length on mechanical properties like tensile strength, flexural strength, hardness of composites is studied.

The corn production in Indonesia, based on the data from Badan Pusat Statistik in 2011, amounted to 17.6 million tons, the corn husk from the corn crop is about 38.38%. The utilization of corn husk itself has not been maximized yet, so the research to maximize the utilization of corn husk is required. In this research, the biocomposite of the corn and Linear Low Density Polyethylene (LLDPE) with thermo-pressing method has been made. Biocomposites is made of corn husk variations: LLDPE are 30:70, 40:60, 50:50, 60:40, 70:30, and characterized the mechanical properties (tensile and tear) with a universal testing machine (UTM), biodegradation qualitatively and morphology by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The thermal properties of corn husk is also analyzed by using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). Mechanical analysis indicates the increasing of the mechanical properties with the addition of LLDPE concentration in biocomposites, with a concentration 30:70 has supreme mechanical properties with 24.77 Mpa of tensile strength, 19.10% elongation, and tear strength of 53.94 N/mm, while the highest elasticity of modulus is owned by the biocomposite with the concentration of 50:50. This result contrasts to the biodegradable analysis, where the greater concentration of the corn husk the higher biodegradability level. Mechanical analysis results are also supported by the results of biocomposites morphological analysis and LLDPE.

The aim of this study was to determine the potential of new Aspergillus strain isolated from electroplating industry to produce Carboxymethyl Cellulase from agriculture waste. Agricultural wastes have great potential for the production of value added products with special reference to enzymes. Corn husk was used as substrate for Carboxymethyl Cellulase (CMCase) production by Aspergillus species through submerged fermentation. Optimization of parameters such as pH, temperature, substrate concentration was performed for the optimal production of CMCase. The fungal strain produced highest CMCase activity (3.3±0.01 IU/ml) at 5% (w/v) level of corn husk as substrate at 28°C and pH 8 over 72 hrs of incubation.