ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to describe how nanocellulose can be used to bind natural fibres and pulp. To do so, nanocellulose can be obtained by a partial fibrillation of the surface of the natural fibres to be bonded, or it can be simply attached onto them. The chapter discusses the use of nanocellulose as an additional binder for pulp fibres and presents the coating of individual natural fibres with nanocellulose. The nanofibrils form a three-dimensional network structure by wrapping or linking the loose fibres or mats, enhancing selected properties of the mats or non-wovens. Bacterial cellulose was used as binder to create sisal non-wovens using a simple papermaking process to create the final non-wovens, without the need of machinery typically to produce non-wovens. Nanocellulose can be created by fibrillating the surface of (ligno)cellulosic fibres. The surface fibrillation of (ligno)cellulosic fibres causes the elementary fibrils on the surface of the (ligno)cellulosic fibres to disassemble.
