Enhancing sustainability in construction: Investigating starch/clay composites for green material development

The modification of clay material using a natural polymer starch. The authors evaluate the thermal modifications of starch and their impact on the clay composite. They detail the process of preparing starch and examine how varying concentrations of starch (20%, 40%) affect the mechanical properties and structure of the clay composite. A good dispersion of the components in the mix was observed via an electron scanning microscope. Using the nano indentation method, it was observed that the materials with the highest elasticity had the lowest amount of clay and the highest concentration of glycerol. The experimental findings indicate that increasing the concentration of starch and its heat treatment time enhances clay strength by up to 74%. The addition of starch is observed to result in a denser structure for the clay composite, evidenced by an increase in bulk density (up to 2.5%) and reduction in shrinkage by over 1%. This modification approach shows great promise, offering both environmental friendliness and elevated mechanical properties for the resulting clay material.