Ricerc@Sapienza

The effects of a mechanical pretreatment, carried out by a two stages mill followed by fractionation into two different products, were determined on the biodegradability and methane yield of wheat straw. Straw was chopped in a knife mill to an average length of about 30 mm, and a portion was used as reference material. Pretreatment reduced the size of the processed straw, whose median particle size was 300μm and 1200μm for the fine and the coarse fractions, respectively.

In order to investigate the role of plant hybridization in barley on the overall thermomechanical performance of polymeric composites containing their by-products, straws from one self-pollinated (Quench) and two F1 hybrid lines of barley (Tatoo and Zoo) were collected and characterized from the chemical (FTIR), structural (XRD), thermal (TGA) and mechanical (tensile) point of view, and used as reinforcements in a commodity plastic, such as polypropylene.