Microscopic mechanism of cellulose nanofibers modified cemented gangue backfill materials
File(s)
Published version
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Reinforcing the performances of cemented backfill materials to recycle gangue and tailings is crucial for the sustainable development of mineral resources and mining waste management. However, under practical constraints of low cost, high waste ratio, low carbon emission, and low binder consumption, solidifying upcycles of mining wastes with toxicity, porosity, and mollification to cemented backfill materials with superior properties are inherently contradictory and challenging. This study reported a waste-to-wealth pathway that improves cemented gangue backfill materials by cellulose nanofibers to recycle mining wastes and partially replace cement. Mechanical compression, X-ray diffraction, thermogravimetry, mercury intrusion porosimetry, scanning electron microscopy tests, fractal quantitative analyses of microstructures, and molecular dynamics simulations were carried out to reveal the action mechanism of TEMPO-modified cellulose nanofibers on cemented gangue backfill materials. The difference in the contribution of TEMPO-modified cellulose nanofibers and mechanical cellulose nanofibers to the strengths of cemented gangue backfill materials was analyzed. The results show a series of microscopic improvements of cellulose nanofibers on cemented gangue backfill materials, including regulating cemented gel polymerization, increasing hydration nucleation, inhibiting carbonization, densifying pore structure, enhancing Ca-O connections and H bonds, and preventing C-S–H fracture along interlayer water. Excessive cellulose nanofibers are also found to be harmful to this composite mainly by delaying hydration crystallization and increasing pores by entrapping air, while it still exhibits improvements in deformation resistance and energy absorption despite strength deterioration. The strength and energy absorption reinforcements of this cemented hybrid materials induced by cellulose nanofibers with optimal dosage can reach up to 30 ~ 50%.
Date Issued
2025-04-01
Date Acceptance
2025-02-07
Citation
Advanced Composites and Hybrid Materials, 2025, 8 (2)
ISSN
2522-0128
Publisher
Springer
Journal / Book Title
Advanced Composites and Hybrid Materials
Volume
8
Issue
2
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) 2025 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material. You do not have permission under this licence to share adapted material derived from this article or parts of it. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/.
Identifier
10.1007/s42114-025-01270-9
Subjects
Cemented gangue backfill material
Cellulose nanofiber
Mechanical property
Microstructure
Molecular dynamic modelling
Publication Status
Published
Article Number
177
Date Publish Online
2025-02-19