Synthesis and Characterisation of Biodegradable Carboxymethyl Cellulose Microcarriers from Oil Palm Empty Fruit Bunch for Therapeutic Applications

Microcarrier offers a convenient way to support cell adhesion and proliferation for biomedical applications. However, commercial microcarriers often have high production costs and limited biodegradability. The use of cellulose-rich oil palm empty fruit bunch (OPEFB) for the development of microcarriers could lead to a cheap, sustainable, and biodegradable cell culturing system. In this research, a series of carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) microcarriers were prepared from OPEFB using FeCl ₃ ionic crosslinker at various polymer and crosslinker levels. The microcarriers were characterised by various instrumental techniques, including assessment of gel content, swelling behaviour, mechanical stability, and in vitro degradation test. The resulting OPEFB-derived CMC-microcarriers exhibited an average size ranging from 1105.52 to 1322.25 µm. SEM analysis revealed that the fabricated CMC-microcarriers exhibited ridges and porous surface morphology and the EDX analysis confirmed the successful ionic crosslinking between the OPEFB-derived CMC biopolymer and FeCl ₃ solution. In contrast with gel content results that increased from 16.95 to 42.65 %, the swelling behaviours regularly decreased from 385 to 32% with increasing concentrations of polymer and crosslinker. Higher concentrated samples (CMC-3, CMC-6, and CMC-9) demonstrated enhanced mechanical stability and reduced sensitivity to the environment due to the higher degree of crosslinking. Nevertheless, all microcarriers displayed a degree of biodegradability ranging from 40 to 90%. Overall, the findings suggest that OPEFB can serve as a cost-effective, sustainable, and biodegradable source of natural biomaterial for microcarrier development, contributing to advancements in tissue engineering and therapeutic applications.