FUNCTIONALITY OF INOCULUMS IN FERMENTED GLUTINOUS RICE FOR THE PREPARATION OF CARBON NANOTUBES

Abstract

Inoculums are term used by microbiologists to describe a starter compound in composting process. Inoculums can be a combination of microbes; includes fungi, yeast and bacteria. In this paper, inoculums was introduced to steamed glutinous rice and a significant effect of the fermented glutinous rice can be observed using Fourier Transmission Infrared (FT-IR). The differences of spectrum before and after fermentation can be clearly seen in 1228 – 1420 cm-1 range. The fermented glutinous rice was further used as a precursor in carbon nanotubes (CNTs) synthesis using thermal CVD. The CNTs was deposited on Ni coated silicon which acts as catalyst in deposition process. The CNTs was characterized using Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) at various spots and magnification. Inoculums amount with 1.0 wt. % of glutinous rice showed the most favorable amount of inoculums as they can produced uniform CNTs rather than the other percentage. This new approach of starting material is expected to be commercialized due to its cheaper and renewable properties.