If you like pina-coladas, you’ll love these silica nanoparticles

In Costa Rica, scientists at the country’s National Laboratory of Nanotechnology are extracting nanocellulose from the peel and stem of pineapples to produce materials for fertilizers.

According to José R. Vega-Baudrit, director of LANOTEC, pineapple waste has been studied extensively, but LANOTEC is the first to see the rosette-like silica-based microparticles.

“I began to study the plant, to make the cuts, to see what it had, and incredibly, after doing the synthesis, I began to see those rosettes, like flowers, that did not fall apart under duress,” says chemical engineer and material scientist Yendry Corrales-Ureña. “It was wonderful. We had thousands, millions, of the same structures left over.” Many commercial fertilizers contain silica.

Costa Rica produces 4.5 million tons of pineapple crop waste every year. Currently, most of that waste is dumped in forests and becomes a breeding ground for mosquitoes.

LANOTEC’s work was described in a recent issue of Scientific Reports.