With the attempt to develop an environmentally safe whey protein-based adhesive with good water resistance, a low-molecular-weight PFO was used as a modifier, and the effects of scavengers on the formaldehyde emission and bond properties were investigated. Plywood evaluation and HPLC analysis indicated that the PFO synthesized with a low content of sodium hydroxide as a catalyst (NaOH/phenol mole ratio = 0.064) at a low reaction temperature (60-75oC) had good water solubility and very low viscosity that was preferable to the modification of whey protein-based adhesives. Combinations of ammonia and sodium sulfite as formaldehyde scavengers had positive effects on the formaldehyde emissions of plywood panels bonded by the PFO-modified whey protein adhesives and had slight effects on bond properties. A necessary stoichiometric excess of ammonia-sulfite combination during PFO post-treatment is critical to effectively reduce formaldehyde emission. The whey protein-based adhesive modified with the most preferable post-treated PFO is water-resistant and environmentally safe, which had a dry shear bond strength of 1.98 MPa and a 28 hour-boiling-dry-boiling wet shear strength of 1.73 MPa according to standard JIS K6806-2003, a formaldehyde emission of 0.067mg/L according to standard JIS A5908, and undetectable level of free phenol by HPLC.
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Wang et al. (2012) studied this question.