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International Journal of Fiber and Textile Research

Universal Research Publications. All rights reserved

ISSN 2277-7156
Original Article
Fiber morphology and Pulping study of Banana Pseudo-stem
1,2

M. Z. H. Khan*, 3M. A. R. Sarkar, 4Md. Forhad Ibne Al Imam,1Raimo O.Malinen

1
Dept. of Pulp and Paper Technology, Asian Institute of Technology (AIT), Thailand
2
Dept. of Chemical Engineering, Jessore Science and Technology University, Jessore 7408, Bangladesh
3
Dept. of Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology, Jessore Sci. and Tech. University, Jessore 7408, Bangladesh
4
Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, Pabna Polytechnic College, Pabna, Bangladesh
*corresponding author: Dr. M. Z. H. Khan, Email: zaved.khan@yahoo.com
Received 03 March 2013; accepted 05 April 2013
Abstract
This study deals with the determination of chemical composition, fiber morphology, and the pulping potentialities of
banana pseudo-stems growing in Thailand. Banana stem was cooked by Kraft process with different chemical charges and
a wide range of time and temperature, and the optimal pulping conditions were established. The lignin and extractive
content was found low. The only discouraging finding was the relative high amounts of ash and water solubility of raw
material. Unbleached banana kraft pulp in the kappa number range of 23-28 was not easy to bleach with three stages
sequence of D0-EP-D1. Kappa number, yield, viscosity is used to describe the extent of lignin removal in the cooking
process.
2013 Universal Research Publications. All rights reserved
Keywords: Banana stem; fiber morphology, chemical composition; kraft pulping; bleaching.
1. Introduction
In view of the shortage of conventional raw materials for
pulping and the increasing demand for paper products
worldwide, non-wood plants and agricultural residues
attracted renewed interest. Non-wood plants offer several
advantages including short growth cycles, moderate
irrigation and fertilization requirements and low lignin
content resulting to reduced energy and chemicals use
during pulping [1, 2].
Today, most modern pulp and paper enterprises rely on
wood [3]. Many non-wood fibers, such as bamboo, jute,
straw, rice, abaca and bagasse, are currently used in small
commercial pulping operations [4]. Other agricultural
residues such as banana stem possess characteristics
suitable for paper making [5, 6]. Banana is one of the
important fruit and vegetable crop plants and belongs to the
genus Musa. Other well-known species are abaca (Musa
extilis) and other wild banana plants used as a source of
fibers for the paperand cordage industries [7,8].
Banana pseudo stem has been known as a potential
cellulose source, though usually discarded as agricultural
waste in many countries. The composition of banana
pseudo stem obtained by elemental analysis, as determined
by Bilba etal. [9]. Despite low lignin content, the
delignification of banana stems appears difficult. However

31

some authors think banana stem can give a high quality

specialty fibre with high yield if the preparation of the
material is adequate. Heikal et al. compared the kraft [10]
and nitric acid [11] pulping of retted and unretted banana
chips. They reported that pulping of retted samples gave
pulps with better chemical and strength properties than that
from unretted samples.
Banana stem pulping has been the subjected to conflicting
reports that showed pulping agent like caustic soda, caustic
soda and sodium sulphiteor calcium bisulphite do not
produce an easily bleachable pulp [12]. The use of
renewable agricultural by products for pulp production as
non-wood cellulosic fibers would be great advantage for
countries with limited wood forests, and would increase the
profit of farmers in developing countries [13,14]. This fact
was mainly motivated by the increasing consumption of
wood fiber based products, such as panel, composites,
textile grade fibers, paper and boards .This demand is
currently solved by using increasing amount of recycle
fibers [15].
In this study we examined a wide range of cooking
conditions for banana fiber pulping. The extraction of fiber
from the pseudostem is not a common practice and much of
the stem is not used for production of fibers. The behaviour
of the fibers also gives important hint regarding their

International Journal of Fiber and Textile Research 2013; 3(1): 31-35

subsequent behaviour as reinforcement in composites. The

effects of different cooking on fiber properties were also
studied. The detailed comparison study was done between
the fiber properties of banana fiber with others.
2. Experimental
2.1 Raw Material:
The raw material used for this research was whole length
banana stem. Banana stem was collected from a common
species in Thailand. This type of banana plant is generally
growing all over the country. The stem was cut from plant
and chopped in small pieces (2-3 inch) and let it sun dry for
about 3/4 days in the open air. After sun dried the OD
measurement had done and prepared it for cooking.
2.2 Pulping:
Cooking: Five cooks were done in an air bath digester of
six autoclaves. Cooking liquor was prepared from solid
NaOH pallets by dissolving them in water and
concentration of NaOH was determined (SCAN-N 2.88).
Since the packing of raw material very low, only 100g (as
OD) per each autoclave could be used for cooking in
digester.
2.3 Bleaching of Chemical Pulp:
Bleaching sequence and conditions have been given in
Table 3.3. Bleaching was done after oxygen delignification.
Pulps were taken in plastic bags in a water bath. Bleaching
chemicals and water were added into pulp together and the
mixture was heated near to reaction temperature in
microwave oven. Pulp was mixed well during bleaching

time every 15 minutes. After every stage pH of filtrate was

measured and after D stages residual chlorine was
determined. Pulp was then washed by diluting and
dewatering procedure; first it was diluted to consistency 5%
and then dewatered.
3. Results and Discussions
3.1 Chemical composition and fiber morphology of
banana stem fiber:
Chemical Composition: The chemical composition of
banana stem fiber is shown in Table 1. The first remark
concerns the high amount of ash (approximately 16%)
which is common for annual plants. The ash content is high
for industry processing. The second remark is the low
amount of lignin, i.e. approximately 15%, to compare with
other annual plants. In spite of high content of ash, this raw
material is worth pulping, mainly because of its relatively
low lignin content. The quantity of extractives in
Methanol/Benzene (1:2) was 3.52% that is medium when
compared with other wood and some other annual plants.
Holocellulose is a collective term referring to the entire
polysaccharide portion of wood.
Another important remark is high water solubility
(approximately 15%). This is one of the reasons why the
total yield after cooking is low. As the water solubility is
high, for this reason we analyze extractive after passing the
sample through water solubility analysis. The experiments
provided basic and important information on the usability
of banana fiber for paper making.

Table 1: Chemical compositions of banana stem fiber

Raw material
Banana stem

Hollocellulose (%)
61.5

Lignin (%)
14.9

Pentosans (%)
12.8

Comparison of chemical composition between banana

fibers together with other general raw materials: The
chemical composition and solubility results of banana fiber
with other common raw materials shown in Fig.1 below

Figure 1: Chemical composition and solubility of banana

stem fiber together with some other raw materials
Banana stem fiber had the lowest lignin content followed
by other general raw materials (Fig. 1). The most striking
result is that banana stem fiber has high ash content.
Another important thing is water solubility of banana fiber.

32

1.73 mm

Extractives (%)
3.52

Water solubility (%)

14.91

Banana fiber has a much more hot water solubility than

other raw materials.
Fiber Morphology:
The chemical composition of the pulps has a strong
influence on the fiber properties. Cellulose is the main
strength-giving component, hemicelluloses are softeners in
the wet state, and lignin gives wet stiffness and resistance
to strength development through refining. The amount of
lipophilic extractives in pulp is always rather small but they
may still be quite disturbing. Fiber morphology is a
dominating factor for pulp quality (both the structure of the
fiber wall and the fiber dimensions). Fiber length and
coarseness are important quality criteria asis the
heterogeneity of the fibrous material. In these respects there
is a fundamental difference between softwood and
hardwood pulps which determines how they are used.
The result of fiber analysis of banana stem fiber is shown in
Table 2. The average fiber length of banana stem fiber was
found to be around 1.7 mm. Banana fibers have shown high
variability along the length and between fibers, which is a
characteristic of natural fibers. The standard deviation has
been found to decrease with increasing diameter of fibers.
The diameter variability had a normal distribution.

Table 2: Fiber analysis result based on Length weighted average values

Name of Sample
Fiber length
Fiber width
Banana stem

Ash (%)
15.7

31.4 m

Coarseness

Fines

0.15 mg/m

21.1 %

International Journal of Fiber and Textile Research 2013; 3(1): 31-35

Comparison of fiber characteristics between banana fibers shows fiber morphology of banana stem fiber compared
together with other general raw materials: Below Table 3 with other common raw materialsTable 3: Fiber characteristics of banana fiber compared to other general raw materials
Raw material
Sisal
Eucalyptus
Soft wood
Bamboo
Hard wood
Banana stem

Fiber length (mm)

3
1.0-1.1
2-3.5
2.7
0.7-1.6
1.7

Fiber width (m)

20
9-10
30-45
14
16-25
31.4

Coarseness (mg/m)
0.104
0.074
0.160-0.340
0.070-0.12
0.15

The general morphology of the fibrous elements of banana

stem is presented in Fig.2. It is evident that the figure
represents in fact a variety of cells of very different size,
form and structure, and each cell has a different role on a
fibrous network. Here, in the term fiber used is meant to
include all types of cells found in the material.

Figure 4: Effect of alkali (AA) charge on screening reject

Figure 2: Cells from the stem of Banana (Image taken
from L & W fiber analyzer)
3.2 Chemical Cooking and Bleaching
Chemical cooking of Banana stem fiber and pulp
characteristics: A wide range of yield (19-41) % was found
with the mentioned chemical charge with different cooking
conditions. Considering chemical charge, yield, kappa
number, viscosity etc., 14 18 % AA charge seems to be
the reasonable range. Yield decrease with increase of
chemical charge (Fig. 3). High temperature and long time
(170oC and 120 min) is required for maximum yield.
Because of the bulky nature of the banana stem, it is
necessary to maintain the liquor/matter ratio for uniform
chip impregnation and solubilization of the dissolved
matter (lignin and hydrolyzed hemicelluloses fragments).
So the higher cooking liquor content allowed improving
simultaneously the pulping and the yield of the pulp.
Screening reject decreases with increase of chemical
charge. At the same chemical charge screening reject is low
if H-factor is high. Also total yield is low when screening
reject is low. That means at high H-factor cellulose
degrades. The effect of alkali charge on screening reject has
been shown below (Figure 4).In case of chemical pulping
the screening reject was found 5-14 %, which seems very
high. At high chemical charge reject is lower.

Because of the bulky nature of the banana stem, it is

necessary to maintain the liquor/matter ratio for uniform
chip impregnation and solubilization of the dissolved
matter (lignin and hydrolyzed hemicelluloses fragments).
So the higher cooking liquor content allowed improving
simultaneously the pulping and the yield of the pulp. Figure
5show that the residual alkali concentration at the end of
the lower cook zone (at the end of bulk delignification)
shows a good correlation with cellulose yield. Cellulose
yield increases by decreasing the residual alkali
concentration regardless of cooking temperature. Black
liquor pH increases with the increase of chemical charge.
Residual alkali charge increases with the increase of active
alkali (AA).

Figure 5: Effect of alkali (AA) charge on residual alkali

(RA) in black liquor

Figure 3: Effect of alkali (AA) charge on yield (Condition:

Figure 6: Effect of alkali (AA) charge on Kappa Number
14 % AA, 1700C, 120 min)
International Journal of Fiber and Textile Research 2013; 3(1): 31-35

33

The effect of alkali charge on kappa number was shown in

Fig. 6. Kappa number decreases very slowly with increase
of chemical charge. Temperature and time has little effect
on kappa number. H-factor does not affect much kappa
number with same chemical charge.
The positive impact of cooking to a higher kappa number
on the unbleached pulp viscosity was shown in Fig. 7 and
can be explained by the higher pulp viscosity. Due to the
fact that the viscosity loss during the cooking is affected in
a similar way for both high and low kappa pulps, a higher
unbleached viscosity is obtained from a high kappa pulp.

Figure 7: Effect of kappa number on pulp viscosity

Figure 8: Effect of kappa number on yield

Table 4: Bleaching result after every stage

Parameter
D0
EP
D1
Residual ClO2 (g/l)
0.064
Residual H2O2 (g/l)
0.012
Kappa Number
14.90
11.21
6.4
Brightness % ISO
19.36
32.34
44.81
Viscosity
790
620
585
End pH
5.91
Bleaching increase brightness as well as reduces the
viscosity and yield of bleached pulp. The brightness and
viscosity of pulp depend on the initial kappa number and
initial viscosity of pulp and the amount of bleaching
chemical charge in the process. Higher chemical charge in
the bleaching of better quality unbleached pulp provides
high brightness with high yield and acceptable viscosity.
Loss of pulp during washing is also a reason of low yield
pulp after every bleaching stage. Even though high
chemical charges used for this bleaching program, the
kappa was still high after D1 stage (kappa 6.4) with a high
end pH.
Conclusion
Banana fiber at present is a waste product of banana
cultivation and either not properly utilized or partially done
so. The main objective of this study was to establish the
suitability of banana stem fiber as a potential source of
lignocellulosic fibers for paper making. This study shows
that banana stem fiber had a lower lignin content but very
high ash content compared with other general raw
materials. Its average fibre length was found (1.7 mm). The
highest yields 48.61% can be prepared with a relatively
small alkali charge (14%) within 120 min at170C.
Drainage of pulp was extremely slow. Because of the
lowest quality of its pulp it is not suitable for fine paper
making. However there is scope for further research to
completely characterize the banana fibers and facilitate
proper applications in natural fiber reinforced composites.
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Since the variation of pulp yield depends mainly on the

cellulose yield under different cookingconditions, its
impact on Kappa number of the unbleached pulp is plotted
in Fig.8. The unbleached pulp Kappa number shows a
correlation with the cellulose yield. A higher Kappa
number of unbleached pulp is obtained at a higher cellulose
yield.
3.3 Bleaching of Banana Stem fiber Soda pulp
Before bleaching the pulp was oxygen delignified (High
yield pulp was selected). After oxygen delignified the
kappa was 19.9. After cooking brightness was 6.56% ISO,
after oxygen delignification brightness was 8.42% ISO.
Bleaching was done three stages bleaching. The sequence
was D0-EP-D1, where pulp was bleached with high
bleaching chemical charge, pH was controlled within the
specified range and pulp was washed several times with
distilled water.
Even though high chemical charges used in bleaching but
after D0 stage residual ClO2 only 0.064 g/l. Viscosity
reduction was within a reasonable figure. The summary of
bleaching result is presented in tabulated form (Table 4).
Here only the specific results are shown.
International Journal of Fiber and Textile Research 2013; 3(1): 31-35

34

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Source of support: Nil; Conflict of interest: None declared

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International Journal of Fiber and Textile Research 2013; 3(1): 31-35