Sustainable development of biomaterials using ionic liquids

Abstract

This review summarizes and critically addresses the advances achieved on the processing of biomaterials, namely films, scaffolds, and nanoparticles, using ionic liquids as alternative solvents. Biomaterials composed of proteins, polysaccharides, and their blends are here considered. Despite their relevance, the low solubility of these compounds in most solvents represents a major limitation on biomaterials processing. The use of ionic liquids as solvents allows to overcome this limitation towards the development of simpler, more efficient and sustainable processes for the processing of biomaterials with enhanced properties. Nevertheless, the used ionic liquids also have some disadvantages that need to be overcome when foreseeing the development of sustainable biomaterials processing, being discussed herein.