Method of producing polysaccharide foams
AssigneeAlbany International Research Co.
InventorsGeorge Bakis, Dana Burton Eagles, John F. Tweedie
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Disclosed is a method of producing polysaccharide foams and foams produced by the method. The polysaccharide foams are formed from a wet condition and are convection dried with a flow of warm or hot air. Such foams exhibit improvements over foams dried under ambient conditions. The present invention also discloses the formation of multi-ply foam layers. At least two sheets of foam layers are layered together and laminated either mechanically or chemically to produce a composite structure.
Claims9
A method of forming a polysaccharide foam from an aqueous solution of a polysaccharide, consisting essentially of the steps of:
- a) forming an aqueous solution of a polysaccharide and a foam stabilizer;
- b) introducing a gas into the aqueous solution to form a wet foam;
- c) drying the wet foam with heated air to form a dried polysaccharide foam;
- d) subsequently cross-linking or coagulating the dried foam to form a water insoluble foam with cross-linking di- or tri-valent cations.
A method of producing an alginate foam from an aqueous solution of an alginate, said foam exhibiting a lower bulk density relative to ambient air-dried foams while exhibiting a greater capacity to absorb calf serum relative to ambient air dried foams, comprised of the steps of:
- a) forming an aqueous solution of an alginate;
- b) introducing a gas into the aqueous solution to form a wet foam;
- c) drying the wet foam with heated air to form a dried alginate foam;
- d) cross-linking or coagulating the foam to form a water insoluble foam with cross-linking di- or tri-valent cations;
- e) converting the water insoluble foam by treating the foam with an aqueous solution containing solubilizing mono-valent cations so that at least a portion of the cross-linking di- or tri-valent cations in the foam are replaced by the mono-valent cations thereby imparting a degree of solubility in the foam;
- f) immersing the converted and cross-linked foam in an alcohol and redrying the foam.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.