A Review of Wheat Gluten-Based Bioplastics Processing and Their Applications

Abstract

Bioplastics produced from agricultural resources are gaining attraction in recent years because of their sustainability and potential biodegradability. Wheat gluten (a wheat protein) is among the potential feedstocks, which stands out because of its availability, low price, good biodegradability, and good viscoelastic properties. This paper provides state-of-art information on the processing of wheat-based bioplastics with their potential applications. It gives an overview of the structure of wheat gluten, its manufacturing processes (casting, thermoforming, extrusion, compression molding, injection molding), thermal-mechanical properties (tensile strength, elongation at break, young’s modulus, water vapor pressure, gas permeability, etc.) of processed plastic films and rigid products, methods to improve the properties, potential applications (packaging, biomedical, adhesives, cosmetics), and limitations and prospects of wheat-based bioplastics.