Helping American Industry Thrive

We always talk about all the things that we can do with corn . Recently we received the Corn Refiners Association 2012 Annual Report, where we found to have a very interesting article about some interesting uses. The article is title Refined Corn Products: Helping American Industry Thrive written by Richard Kyle. I’m going to share with you a few things that I found interesting in the article!

Most of us never realize that the result of wet corn milling produces products such as corn starch, syrup and oil, which are used as ingredients for many common products. With many industries relying heavily on the corn industry because of its consistent quality and superior performance. Here are just a few of the industries that without their use of refined corn ingredients they would not be nearly as successful.

 

Paper

Starch is one of the most important ingredients in paper. It gives paper it’s smooth feel, strength, brightness, ink adhesion abilities and erasability improvements. It is also very important in the making of recycled paper because of its bonding strength along with more efficient and cleaner manufacturing.

Adhesives

One of the largest markets for starch-based adhesives is the corrugated board industry (cardboard) and paper bag manufacturing. The starch provides strength to the board and forms water resistant bonds. Starch based adhesives are mainly used for carton/case sealing, tube winding, bottle labeling, envelope seams, school pastes, and leather pasting.

Textiles

Starch is used as a protective coating on yard to ensure it can be handled with minimal breaks or shedding. It will also be used as a textile finish to help with crease-resistance or shrink-resistance softness. Most dye pastes also use starch to help with color dispersion, the controlled transfer of designs to the clothe or just for good color value.

Home Improvements

Starch is often used in this industry as a thickener and binder for things such as wall joint compounds, floor leveling compounds, or tile grouts. In foundry, ceramic applications and manufacturing of bricks and tiles, starch and sweeteners will be used as an anti-cracking additive to maintain even distribution of liquids and solids. It helps to reduce brittleness and deformation of the product.

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Oil Refining & Mining

Starch is often used to cool down superheated oil drilling bits or used to improve the efficiency of ore separation processes. Corn-derived ascorbic acid will be used in oil drilling fluids to protect against iron corrosion and prevent the formation of ferric oxide.

Pharmaceuticals

Refined corn products play an ever increasing role in pharmaceuticals. They can be used to enhance drug delivery systems as binders, diluents, tableting agents and coating agents. They can also be ingredients for formulating intravenous injection solutions and clinical nutrition products.

 

These are just a few of the things mentioned in the article. If you would like to read the entire article visit http://www.corn.org/publications/annual-reports and click on “2012 Corn Annual ”.