Abstract:
Biomass has the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by replacing fossil fuels. The
exponential growth of the human population has led to the accumulation of non-degradable
waste materials across our planet. Bioplastic synthesized from only keratin has fragile and less
flexible and can be improved by adding starch and plasticizer. In this study, chicken feather
keratin, mango seed starch, and glycerol and sorbitol were used. Proximate analysis of chicken
feather was crude lipids (0.79%), total ash (1.45%), crude fiber (2%), moisture (11.9%), and
crude protein (89.5%). The optimum process variables for keratin yield were 6hr., 50oC
temperatures, which gives 79% maximum yield. The composition of the extracted keratin was
characterized using FTIR, the crystalline nature of keratin was characterized by using XRD, and
keratin's thermal stability was characterized using TGA. The starch extracted from mango seed
had 2.17% crude protein, 6.66% crude lipids, 8.5% total ash, 10.5% moisture, 34.37% crude
fiber, and 37.8% carbohydrates. The film was synthesized by conducting 20 experiments by
using CCD response surface rotatable (k<6) and analyzed by design expert 11, by conducting
three factors of dry oven temperature(35-65oC), plasticizer(GLY and SOR) concentration (20-
50%)w/w and starch concentration(30-70%) w/w of keratin (7g) basis. The three responses were
tensile strength(TS), water absorption(WA), and elongation at the break (EA) of the synthesized
bioplastic film. The result obtained in the range were (10-17.86MPa) TS, (8.99-20%) EA and
(19.45-27.5%) WA. The obtained results at the optimal point were 17.76MPa TS, 8.98% EA and
19.44% WA at a combination of 49.94oC dry oven temperature, 34.60% plasticizer (GLY and
SOR), and 49.94% Starch concentrations. Moisture, solubility, transparency, and thickness of the
film were determined. The film was also characterized using TGA, XRD and FTIR. This study
indicates that higher strength, low water absorbent, and good thermally stable bioplastic film can
be produced from chicken feather keratin via mango seed starch by blending two different
plasticizers (GLY and SOR)
