Wood modification with nanoparticles fortified polymeric resins for producing nano-wood composites: a review

Wood is one of the renewable building materials which can meet the increased global demand for sustainable materials. However, the wood-based sector is experiencing challenges in meeting the rising market demand for high-quality wood and wood-based products because of scarce supply and legal prohibitions on harvesting trees in natural forests. Fast-growing plantation trees are being extensively studied as a prospective raw material source in order to meet the rising demand. But the timber extracted from the fast-grown plantations has some serious drawbacks, such as lower density, poor strength, dimensional instability and susceptibility to biodegrading agencies, limiting its widespread usage in various residential and industrial applications. To overcome these issues, wood is being modified with various types of thermoset and thermoplastic resins by impregnation method, which can substantially improve its properties to suit different applications. Nanomaterials have gained popularity in recent years due to their high efficacy and enormous potential to improve wood properties. The properties of wood can be greatly improved by combining conventional wood modification techniques with nanotechnology. Wood modification using resins fortified with nanomaterials further improves properties of resin modified wood and provide additional properties at low concentrations. Therefore, the nano-wood composites prepared using nanoparticles fortified resins have the potential to replace high-quality wood for various value-added applications and fast-growing trees can serve as a sustainable source of raw material.