Patent ID: 8551502

Claim:
A process of producing a composite material comprising a hydrogel and cellulose, comprising the steps of: synthesizing cellulose using an effective microorganism in a microbial fermentation synthesis process utilizing agitation to give a suspension of cellulose nanofibers; isolating the cellulose nanofibers produced by the microbial fermentation process; forming an aqueous cellulose suspension of the cellulose nanofibers while preventing the cellulose nanofibers from being dried out between the time they are produced and suspended in an aqueous liquid; and mixing a hydrogel-forming material with the aqueous cellulose suspension to form a mixture and heating the resulting mixture at a sufficiently high temperature for a sufficiently long period of time for the hydrogel-forming material to dissolve into solution, thereafter solidifying the mixture to form the composite hydrogel material.