ABSTRACT
Biopolymer-zeolite composites are a combination of a biopolymer matrix and micro-/ nano-sized zeolites, in the form of beads, membranes, and bers. Biopolymerzeolite composites have received considerable attention over the last decade owing to their potential to dramatically enhance the properties relative to the raw zeolite or the pristine biopolymer matrix (Bhat and Aminabhavi 2009, Dragan et al. 2010, Lin and Zhan 2012, Metin et al. 2013, Saraswathi and Viswanath 2012). Incorporation of small amounts of zeolites leads to an improvement of the composite properties, such as mechanical strength and thermal and chemical stability. On the other hand, the biopolymer matrix arises with additional features like biodegradability, biocompatibility, antibacterial activity, and chelating properties. The properties of the biopolymer-zeolite composites can be also controlled by micro-/nanostructural parameters such as dimension, shape, distribution, volume fraction, alignment, and packing arrangement of zeolites (Caro et al. 2000, Dogan 2012, Vu et al. 2002). Development and tailoring of biopolymer-zeolite composites offer the possibility to promote their use in many elds of applications like automotive, aerospace, building, electrical, optoelectronic, biomedical, and environmental protection.
