Cashew Nut Shell Liquid-Based Coordination Polymers: An Overview of Analytical Techniques

The last decades have seen an upsurge in the synthesis of coordination polymers (CPs), which became a notable topic of interest in the field of science due to their inherent features, such as porosity, larger inner surface area, tunable pore size, and diverse topologies and many more. The synthesis of CPs involves the use of petroleum-derived ligands, multi-step processes, use of volatile organic solvents and limited solubility. In addition, due to a continual rise in the cost and impending exhaustion of petroleum resources, the production of these CPs from renewable resources have been an area of keen interest among the researchers of both the industrial and academic world. Among all the renewable resources, cashew nut shell liquid (CNSL) and its constituents possessing inherent functional sites proved to be a valuable precursor for polymer as well as CPs synthesis. The CNSL/or its constituents (cardanol/Col) derived CPs with applications in wastewater treatment or as antibacterial agents are a great topic of interest.

In the present chapter, a brief description of petro-based as well as renewable resource (CNSL) based CP has been included and the analytical techniques that are used for the characterization of these CNSL based CPs in order to understand their composition, behavior and their potential applications in different fields have been discussed.

Keywords: Analytical techniques, Cashew nut shell liquid, Coordination polymer, Morphology, Renewable resource, Spectral analysis, Thermal analysis.