natural fiber for the construction of hybrid bio-composites. In the current research project, a thorough analysis of the use of soy-PF resin for the creation of composites reinforced with jute was conducted. A novel and practical cutlery material was created after the mechanical properties were evaluated and optimized. In order to study the value addition of these newly proposed biocomposite materials as an ecological alternative in terms of natural resources versus synthetic resources, variables such as hardness, cytotoxicity, and degrading qualities of composites were also explored. | Received 22 August 2022 Revised 7 July 2023 Accepted 23 August 2023 DOI RESEARCH ARTICLE Mechanical and cytotoxic analysis of cutlery developed from phenol-formaldehyde modified soy-jute composite Ajaya Kumar Behera1 Shruti Swaroop Pattnaik1 Chirasmayee Mohanty1 Rohit Srivastav2 Jyotsnarani Pradhan3 1 Department of Chemistry Utkal University Bhubaneswar Odisha India Abstract 2 University of Massachusetts UMass Lowell The need of the hour is for the creation of natural fiber-based biodegradable Massachusetts USA cutlery in order to protect our planet from pollution caused by plastic. Soy 3 Department of Biotechnology Utkal University resin creates a hard eco-friendly biodegradable composite when combined with Bhubaneswar Odisha India phenol-formaldehyde resole and a natural fiber like jute. In this experiment soy and other ingredients are combined with various weight percentages of resoles. Correspondence Jute-modified soy composites are characterized through Fourier transform infra- Ajaya Kumar Behera Department of Chemistry Utkal University Bhubaneswar Odisha 751004 red spectroscopy mechanical testing and found maximum tensile strength of India. MPa. After 8 weeks of microbial degradation testing on the generated Email ajayabehera@ composites it is discovered that the mechanically optimized composite lost only of its initial weight. Cutlery pieces are molded using the jute-soy jute-resole Funding information Odisha State Higher Education Council modified soy composition and cytotoxicity testing has shown that they are non- Bhubaneswar toxic. Because they are non-toxic and biodegradable these composites can be used as a substitute to non-biodegradable plastic in a range of industries. KEYWORDS cytotoxicity green composites jute phenol-formaldehyde soy resin 1 INTRODUCTION lignocellulosic fibers used as reinforcing agents for com- posite structures for 4 Due to their distinctive The demand for .
