Back to News

Colorful illustration of community recycling efforts

Making Waste Productive

Apr 8, 2025

By Merrill Meadow | Illustrations by Sam Falconer

Researchers demonstrate how “innovative reuse” can be a catalyst for greener manufacturing and sustainable economic development

Do you ever throw something away and think about where it will end up? Have you wondered if a piece of trash will ever serve a useful purpose again — and, if so, what form it may take?

Those are increasingly important questions because each year, the world creates about two billion tons of municipal solid waste. While roughly 20% of it is recycled, the rest goes into landfills — including everything from food packaging and leftover food to clothes and furniture to machinery and electronics and much more. Projections suggest that global annual waste will grow by 50% over the next several decades.

Complicating the issue is the fact that the world’s growing “waste problem” is not just a matter of determining where to dump 50% more trash. There is a clear need to reduce the amount of natural resources and energy used in producing replacement products; and to limit the toxic chemicals and environmental pollutants often employed in current manufacturing processes.

Jefferson researchers are helping drive that work forward. Employing materials found in garbage bins, trash dumps and fields overgrown with invasive plants, these scientists, engineers, business strategists and designers are finding innovative ways to reuse waste materials to develop greener research-and-development processes and more sustainably manufactured products.

Grounds for Greener Chemistry

A huge portion of the world’s economy depends on decades-old chemical processes that are expensive, energy-intensive and harmful to the environment. One of the most important challenges facing scientists today is developing new, “green” processes that achieve the same goals but are more environmentally and economically sustainable. Thus, researchers are searching for natural, nontoxic, inexpensive and readily available sources of useful chemicals.

Chemistry researcher Niny Z. Rao, PhD, and physics researcher Brian Yust, PhD, have demonstrated the utility of one such source: used coffee grounds. “Coffee has great potential as a component in green chemistry,” explains Dr. Rao, who has studied the chemistry of coffee for more than a decade. “Even spent coffee grounds contain bountiful amounts of antioxidants and other naturally occurring chemicals.”

In particular, their research has shown that spent coffee grounds can drive the process of creating gold and silver nanoparticles. “Nanoparticles are ultra-fine materials with unique properties, and they are essential to innovative technologies ranging from improved food packaging to advanced medical imaging,” says Dr. Yust. “Unfortunately, standard processes for synthesizing nanoparticles can require hazardous chemicals and create toxic waste by-products.”

The scientists knew that spent coffee grounds contain antioxidants, which are great “scavengers” and attach themselves to certain other molecules. One of the most important antioxidants is chlorogenic acid, which can catalyze the nano-crystallization of gold or silver atoms in a solution. “Therefore, we hypothesized that combining coffee’s natural chemicals with some gold and silver would prompt a nanoparticle crystallization process,” Dr. Rao says.

They found that even relatively small amounts of spent coffee grounds — regardless of roast or initial brew method — could be used to create a variety of shapes and sizes of the nanoparticles without using corrosive chemicals or energy-intensive processing. While other research groups have explored using fresh ground coffee or newly brewed coffee to create nanoparticles, Drs. Rao and Yust have demonstrated the potential to use as little as two grams of spent coffee grounds to drive a sustainable nanoparticle synthesis process.

In the current chemistry-focused phase of the ongoing project, Dr. Rao says, “We are learning about the utility of different coffee varieties and brewing methods for creating different chemical catalysts. We’re also exploring the specific role of active antioxidants present in the coffee extract, and how the full range of chemicals in spent coffee grounds can be used for other nano-chemistry purposes.”

On the physics side, Dr. Yust explains, “We’re exploring the effect that specific chemical constituents in the extracts have on the final size and shape of nanoparticles. Having fine control over these effects should enable us to create nanoparticles of specific dimensions and structures, such as the gold nanorod shapes that are used in a number of medical applications.”

Unweaving Wool Waste

“Waste wool” is the generic term for what’s left over from the million-plus tons of wool manufactured into myriad consumer and industrial products each year. By some estimates, hundreds-of-thousands of tons of waste wool are produced globally each year — much of it ending up in landfills.

But two Jefferson researchers — Brian George, PhD, and Ryan Masoodi, PhD, — have been pursuing an initiative that, if successful, will reroute wool waste away from the landfill and towards commercially viable products that capitalize on wool’s natural moisture-wicking and insulation properties. Their project could also lead to the creation of new businesses and jobs.

Dr. George says, “We are developing methods that, we believe, could be applied to many kinds of textile waste materials and used for an expanding array of purposes, from suppressing weeds to creating warmth-retaining clothing to insulating buildings or vehicles.”

The first step of the project, which got underway in late 2022, was to characterize the fibers provided from waste wool provided by a Pennsylvania-based manufacturer. “We began by assessing factors such as fiber length and quality,” Dr. Masoodi explains. “We then determined what nonwoven production methods would allow us to convert the raw material into sheets of fabric.” Nonwoven fabrics can be created relatively rapidly because the fibers do not need to be converted into yarn first.

“Once we identified the best method to create the fabric,” Dr. Masoodi says, “we engaged in a series of experiments, prototyping, and testing of products with a variety of characteristics — ranging from degree of thickness, strength and stiffness to heat resistance and flame-retardancy, insulating capacity and moisture absorption.”

Then, in collaboration with their Pennsylvania-based industry partners, they identified specific commercial applications for the fabric types they had developed — for example, as sound and thermal insulation. One of the criteria was that the resulting products should be capable of long-term use, instead of single-use products that could quickly end up in a waste dump again.

At this point, they have identified two specific products with commercial potential and created samples for their manufacturing partner to use in market testing. “While we can't discuss the specific results of the testing, our industry partners are committed to bringing sustainably focused investment into the state. So, this could be a ‘win’ for everyone,” says Dr. George.

Using Hemp to Promote Growth

Dr. George is also excited about the rich possibilities of using materials from a plant he and his colleagues consider vastly underutilized: Hemp. “It may be the quintessential example of sustainable use,” he says. “No matter what the initial purpose for growing a crop of hemp, there appears to be a potential use for almost every part of the plant.”

Dr. George and his colleague Jason Crook, MBA, teaching assistant professor of business, are pursuing a project to develop hemp-based growing media — the material in which seeds are started and seedlings are potted to hasten their growth. Their aim is to create a replacement for growing media that have unsustainable manufacturing and transportation processes or that harm the environment.

For example, many traditional growing media require peat, but continued peat harvest has had detrimental environmental impact. “In addition,” Dr. George explains, “many existing plant-growth products are a ‘black box’ in terms of the ingredients and include a range of chemical ingredients and inorganic materials. In contrast, hemp is sustainable, quick-growing, and can be grown locally.”

Using materials supplied by Pennsylvania farmers, the team is focusing on growth trials to determine the efficacy of their efforts.

In parallel, Crook led a group of student researchers in analyzing regional, state-wide, and national data about crops that could benefit from a new kind of growing media. “We are using that analysis to optimize hemp-processing approaches that work best for priority crops, and to identify which most effectively address the needs of existing industries and consumer segments,” Crook explains. “With those insights, we have developed go-to-market strategies that could advance sustainable economic development in Pennsylvania."

Their next steps include formally submitting a patent application and determining commercial partners.

“Reusing” Invasive Plants

Invasive plants can have an array of negative environmental effects, from harming native species to harboring ticks that transmit Lyme disease. For the past several years, Jefferson faculty and students — led by textile design researcher Becky Flax, MS, and biology researcher Anne Bower, PhD, — have been developing a novel, sustainable-reuse approach to address the problem: Harvesting invasive plants and using them to create natural, non-toxic alternatives to synthetic dyes for textiles. Their research has focused especially on two troublesome species: Japanese barberry and wineberry.

The researchers — including undergraduate students in pre-medical sciences, biology and health sciences and graduate students in textile design, textile engineering and textile technology — first harvested and processed roots of those plants, created a variety of dyes from that material, and applied them to various organic cotton and wool fabrics used in cold-weather and outdoor apparel. “We found that the dyes were effective in creating a range of attractive earth tone-colors that retained colorfastness despite perspiration and laundering,” says Flax, “They also display promising antimicrobial action against three common disease-causing bacteria.”

The research team then tested dyes created from the plant’s stems and berries. “Our goal is to use as much of the plant as possible,” explains Dr. Bower, who brings to the project her deep knowledge of the invasive plants’ biology and environmental impacts.

Those tests showed that dyes from the stems had similar efficacy to that of the root-derived dyes and resulted in similar colors. However, they found that a larger volume of berries was required to achieve the same degree of dyeing, and the berries’ acidity resulted in a range of lighter-hued, almost pastel-like colors. “The berries’ chemistry may enable us to achieve different effects with various dye formulations,” says Flax. “And excitingly, a single plant can be used to create a broad range of dye colors — from pink to brownish orange to bluish gray.”

Next, the researchers sought input from commercial dye-makers and textile manufacturers on the specific formulations and products of invasive plant-based dyes that might be most useful to them.

They learned two related lessons about the textile market: One, before adopting a novel approach to sourcing dyes, textile manufacturers will want to be assured of the supply of raw materials. Two, large-scale manufacturers will want access to large-scale harvesting of the raw materials. “That, we realized, could create an incentive for them to intentionally plant invasive species crops rather than to seek out and remove them, which is a primary objective for this project,” Dr. Bower says.

Thus, the current goals of the project are two-fold. First, the researchers have broadened the array of invasive plant species being used: Butterfly bush flower, the purple/blue flowers of which surprisingly create an orange dye; cork tree bark, which yields a vivid yellow dye; and crepe myrtle and pokeweed berries, which yield pink and purple dyes, respectively. “This allows us to increase both the range of dye colors available and the supply of raw materials,” Flax explains.

Second, the research team is targeting small, niche companies that would be satisfied with the smaller-scale harvesting that would help to eliminate existing growth of invasive plants. This would also promote small-scale economic development across the region.

Catalyzing Awareness and Opportunity

Each of these projects represent early-stage initiatives focused on carefully targeted research-and-development opportunities. They all offer sustainability related benefits and could help drive new economic development. For example, “From a strategic economic development perspective, hemp is an extraordinary example of an infant-stage industry with the potential to build regional, national and global markets,” says Jason Crook.

“One of our goals is to expand the scientific and public conversation about ways to use this potent and readily available resource,” says Dr. Niny Rao. She’s talking specifically about used coffee, but her words reflect all four research teams’ view of the enormous potential inherent in reusing the world's waste.

Making Waste Productive

Related Links

Share This