DEVELOPING PERFORMANCE BIO-BASED WAXES BY ENGINEERING NANOSCALE AND MESOSCALE CRYSTALLINITY

The ultimate goal of the proposed project is to further understand the nanoscale and mesoscale crystallinity of carnauba wax components and apply this knowledge to engineer the properties of performance bio-based wax products. To this end, our efforts will focus on modeling and investigating the properties of carnauba wax as well as on the engineering of an unprecedented wax material to reduce and replace the use of carnauba wax. Our endeavors are thus low-risk and high-reward.