Patent ID: 8299172
Filing Date: 2012-10-30
Classification: C08H,C08L

Abstract:
1. A method for the preparation of biodegradable plastics, said method consisting essentially of: (I) providing a suspension in a basic aqueous carrier of a finely divided natural material containing a saccharide selected from the group consisting of (II) adding water to the suspension; (III) agitating the suspension for a period of time; (IV) subjecting the product resulting from step (III) to a modifying material that converts any pendant hydroxyl group at any carbon atom of the anhydroglucose unit of the saccharide to a carboxylate, thereby forming a polysaccharide carboxylate, without breaking carbon—carbon bonds that form the ring of the anhydroglucose units of the saccharides, such modification selected from the group consisting of: (V) combining the material resulting from (IV) with a protein and allowing the resulting material and the protein to react with each other by forming interpolymeric electrostatic bonds between the protein and polysaccharide carboxylate molecules without the formation of strong, interpolymeric covalent bonds between the protein and polysaccharide molecules.