Scientists Develop Eco-Friendly Clothing and Dish Detergent Made From Wood Fiber and Corn Protein

To combat some of the more environmentally harmful chemicals in cleaning detergents, scientists have found a way to turn natural materials, including wood fiber and corn protein, into a more eco-friendly detergent.

In a study published in Langmuir, scientists shared their findings on a newly developed detergent that utilizes readily available and renewable materials such as cellulose nanofibers and zein, one of the primary proteins found in corn. These materials were combined into an emulsion that can collectively attract the materials in a stain and trap oils, making it ideal for cleaning.

“Pickering particles can self-assemble to form a rigid barrier film at the oil–water interface, effectively inhibiting droplet aggregation and stabilizing the emulsion,” the authors wrote in the study.

As explained by ScienceDirect, a Pickering emulsion uses solids for stabilizing, rather than using synthetic surfactants. Replacing synthetic surfactants in detergents can help minimize environmental harm, because these chemicals are hard to break down and can be toxic, especially in aquatic environments.

The study authors tested the eco-friendly detergent’s ability to clean ink, chili oil and tomato paste off of cotton fabrics and diningware made of different materials, including glass, ceramic, metal and plastic. For comparison, the team also tested the cleaning power of commercial laundry powder and dish soap on these materials and stains.

In their testing, researchers found that their eco-friendly detergent was only slightly less effective at cleaning cotton compared to the laundry power at equal dilution amounts, but when they used 5% concentration of the detergent compared to 1% of laundry powder, the eco-friendly alternative was more effective.

The team had similar results on cleaning dishes, where both cleaning products worked similarly at the same dilution, but when slightly increasing the concentration of the eco-friendly detergent, it had greater cleaning power than the commercial product.

The findings revealed a potentially viable alternative to detergents that may contain environmentally harmful ingredients. Many cleaning detergents today include alkylphenol polyethoxylates (APEOs), which have been linked to aquatic toxicity and endocrine disruption, and phosphates, the pollution of which can lead to algal blooms in bodies of water.

While alternative detergents have been proposed in previous research, those alternatives have either been found difficult and expensive to produce, challenging to rinse off of fabric and dishes, less effective at cleaning or potentially damaging to fabrics.

In the newly published study, the researchers determined that their detergent did not show signs of damage to the cotton fabric, based on microscopic observations. By using natural, renewable and widely available ingredients, they also expect that this wood fiber- and zein-based detergent could be both effective and affordable to scale in manufacturing.