Applied Acoustics 134 (2018) 60–68

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Applied Acoustics
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apacoust

Corn husk for noise reduction: Robust acoustic absorption and reduced T
thickness
⁎
Xiaoning Tang, Xiansheng Zhang, Huiping Zhang, Xingmin Zhuang, Xiong Yan
Key Laboratory of Textile Science and Technology, Ministry of Education, College of Textiles, Donghua University, Shanghai 201620, China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Corn husk extracted from maize is a potential candidate for the application of noise reduction. The overall goal
Corn husk of this study is to investigate the acoustic absorption properties of corn husk. The effects of multi-layer structure
Multi-layer on the acoustic absorption coefficient were studied. The results indicated that acoustic absorption was not
Back cavity improved with the increase of layers, while the acoustic absorption peak gradually moves to lower frequency
Noise reduction
direction. Furthermore, it has been observed that the increase of back cavity distance can also increase the
Acoustic absorption
absorption coefficient at low frequency range.

1. Introduction
Corn is one of the most widely planted crops in the world, and China
is the second largest producer and consumption market. It has been
produced mainly for daily food, animal feed, and starch production, etc.
[1]. Corn husk is an important byproduct of maize, which has been
either used as animal feeding stuffs or plant fuels. Currently, the ex-
ploration towards this kind of agricultural residues for various appli-
cations is gradually rising. As shown in Table 1, the reported studies for
corn husk are listed. It can be seen that corn husk is good raw materials
for chemical reagent extraction, such as soluble sugar [2], anthocyanins
[3], and polyelectrolytes [4]. The preparation of silver-based nano-
particles [5] and nanocrystalline cellulose [6] through corn husk has
also been reported. In addition, cellulose nano-fibers were successfully
extracted from corn husk by alkaline treatment, oxidation and followed
homogenization process [7].
Corn husk has also been utilized in composites recently. Kwon et al.
[8] reported that using corn husk reinforcement is a positive approach
to improve the mechanical properties of poly(lactic acid) hybrid bio-
composites. Micro-slit plate was also fabricated by degummed corn
husk fiber reinforced thermoplastic polyurethane [9]. Youssef et al.
[10] investigated the suitability of low density polyethylene board, and
the preparation without any treatment for both low density poly-
ethylene as well as corn husk fiber. The results indicated that the in-
crease of corn husk fiber loading is beneficial to improve the mechan-
ical, water absorption and swilling properties of composites. It has been
further reported that the obtained nano-fibrillated cellulose from corn
husk can improve the strength and thermal stability of poly(vinyl al-
cohol) films [11]. Additionally, activated carbon of corn husk was
utilized for methylene blue purification [12]. Corn husk was also di-
rectly crushed and sieved into micro-scale powder. The corn husk
powder was used as alternative bio-adsorbent for dyestuff removal from
aqueous solutions [13].
Recently, the application of natural fibrous materials in noise re-
duction is gradually rising. As shown in Table 2, the acoustic absorption
properties of various natural fiber were investigated, including tea-leaf
fiber, jute fiber, coir fiber, kapok fiber, date palm fiber, fique fiber and
kenaf fiber, etc. It can be seen that natural fibrous materials has good
acoustic absorption properties. However, most of the reported fibrous
materials in noise reduction applications are loose fiber felts. Therefore,
the fabrication process is necessary to produce fibrous acoustic ab-
sorber, such as the commonly used non-woven fabric and fiber felts.
Corn husk has the unique advantage of extremely low production cost.
It can be directly utilized as noise reduction materials just by air-drying
process. Furthermore, the thickness of corn husk is thinner than con-
ventional fiber felts, as shown in Fig. 1. The thickness of corn husk is
much thinner than natural fiber felts, such as fique fiber, kapok/hollow
polyester fiber, coconut fiber and mineralized fiber. Bark cloth has the
similar thickness with corn husk. However, the acoustic absorption
coefficient of corn husk is higher than bark cloth, which can be at-
tributed to the groove structure of corn husk surface [17]. The acoustic
absorption of corn husk is also better than natural fiber/polypropylene
hybrid felts and luffa fiber reinforced composites. In addition, corn husk
can be easily fabricated into multi-layer structure by facile layering
process. Therefore, it can be concluded that corn husk is a potential
candidate for noise reduction applications.
In the present work, the potential of corn husk as acoustic absorp-
tion materials has been studied. The corn husk used in this study was

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: profyaxi@yeah.net (X. Yan).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apacoust.2018.01.012
Received 21 November 2016; Received in revised form 7 April 2017; Accepted 12 January 2018
Available online 19 January 2018
0003-682X/ © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
X. Tang et al. Applied Acoustics 134 (2018) 60–68

Table 1
Typical examples on the studies of corn husk.

No. Key findings Methods References

1 Rapidase Pomaliq is proper enzyme source for the enzymatic production of soluble sugars Alkali treatment and enzymatic Hang and Woodams [2]
from corn husks saccharification
2 Corn husk is a potential source of anthocyanins Chemical extraction Li et al. [3]
3 Potential at industrial scale for biotechnological production Solid state fermentation Mahalaxmi et al. [14]
4 Activated carbon of corn husk for methylene blue purification High temperature carbonization Khodaie et al. [12]
5 Polyelectrolytes produced by corn husk in sewage treatment Hemi-celluloses extraction Landim et al. [4]
6 Corn husk reinforced biodegradable kenaf/corn husk/PLA bio-composites Compounding and extrusion Kwon et al. [8]
7 High absorption towards water and saline solutions Blending corn husk with acrylic acid Li et al. [15]
8 Corn husk is an alternative adsorbent for color wastewater treatment Kinetic and thermodynamic studies Paska et al. [13]
9 Sound absorption of corn cob fiber husk reinforced polyurethane micro-slit plate Degumming and mastication-hot processing Lv et al. [9]
10 Nanocrystalline cellulose extracted from corn husk Chemical extraction and spray-drying process Mendes et al. [6]
11 Green synthesis of silver-based nanoparticles from corn husk extracts Bio-synthesis Villanueva-Ibáñez et al. [5]
12 Corn husk fibers reinforced low-density polyethylene Melt compounding and compression molding Youssef et al. [10]
13 Cellulose nanofibers prepared by the oxidation of corn husk Alkaline-treatment and oxidation Du et al. [7]
14 Corn husk taken as solid fuel Liquid and vapor hydrothermal carbonization Minaret and Dutta [16]
15 Nanofibrillated corn husk cellulose is benefit to improve the strength and thermal stability of Chemical pretreatment and ultrasonication Xiao et al. [11]
poly(vinyl alcohol) films

Table 2
Comparison of noise reduction properties for various natural vegetable fibrous materials.

No. Materials Thickness Key findings References

1 Tea-leaf fiber 10 mm, 20 mm, 30 mm Compared the acoustic absorption of tea-leaf with woven textiles Ersoy and Kucuk. [18]
2 Corn husk, polyethylene 3.2 mm Corn husk can increase acoustic absorption Huda and Yang [19]
3 Bamboo, banana, and jute 4.28 mm, 4.93 mm, 6.43 mm Bamboo/polypropylene has good acoustic absorption Thilagavathi et al. [20]
4 Coir fiber 20 mm, 50 mm The absorption coefficient is 0.8 for f > 1360 Hz at 20 mm thickness Fouladi et al. [21]
5 Ramie, flax and jute 40 mm The hollow lumen contributes to acoustic absorption Yang and Li [22]
6 Kapok fiber 60 mm Kapok fiber has better acoustic absorption than glass wool and degreasing Xiang et al. [23]
cotton
7 Date palm fiber 25 mm Acoustic absorption coefficient of date palm fiber is small at low frequency Khidir et al. [24]
8 Fique fiber 5 mm, 10 mm, 15 mm Fique fiber has the advantages of low weight, low cost and biodegradability Navacerrada et al. [25]
9 Bark cloth 0.7–1.4 mm Sound absorption of natural bark cloth Rwawiire et al. [26]
10 Kenaf, hemp and coconut 50 mm, 100 mm Natural fibrous sound absorbing panels Berardi and Iannace [27]
11 Kapok fiber 5 mm, 10 mm, 20 mm Kapok fiber has better acoustic absorption than polypropylene at low frequency Liu et al. [28]
12 Kapok and milkweed 2.3–13.5 mm Cotton/milkweed nonwoven has better sound reduction than cotton/kapok Ganesan and Karthik. [29]
13 Luffa fiber reinforced epoxy 4.5 mm Alkaline treatment can decrease the sound absorption coefficient Jayamani et al. [30]
14 Corn husk 0.652–2.916 mm Robust acoustic absorption due to the groove structure This study

just washed with distilled water and then dried in air. The manu-
facturing process is green and environmental-friendly, which without
any chemical modification. Furthermore, multi-layer structured corn
husk was fabricated for the improvement of acoustic absorption. The
effects of back cavity with various distance for acoustic absorption ef-
ficient and peak frequency were also investigated. The aim of this paper
is to characterize the acoustic absorption properties of natural corn
husk for noise reduction applications.
2. Experimental
2.1. Materials
The corn husk is a natural product which has been extracted from
corn in the local farmland of Tanglou village, Shangqiu, Henan pro-
vince, China. As shown in Fig. 2(a) and (b), mature corn cob was picked
from the corn field. Corn husk was obtained from the corn cob, as seen
from Fig. 2(c). Then corn husk was air dried and cut for specified size,
as shown in Fig. 2(d). Especially, the raw corn husk was repeatedly
washed with distilled water to remove dust, dirt and impurity, etc.
2.2. Methods
a Digital Frequency Analysis System). The fixed loudspeaker at the end
of impedance tube which generates broadband acoustic waves within
stationary frequency. The specimen of corn husk is placed at the op-
posite end. Incident acoustic signals propagate as plane waves in the
impedance tube, where incident and reflected wave signals are picked
up and analyzed. The mechanical properties are measured by fabric
strength tester (HD026N-300, Hongda Instrument Co., Ltd., Nantong,
China). The test procedure was based on ISO 13934-1-2013 (Part 1:
Determination of maximum force and elongation at maximum force
using the strip method). In this study, con husk sample with 80 mm
diameter was used to test acoustic absorption properties. The schematic
illustration to set test sample in impedance tube as shown in the in-
serted image of Fig. 3. The specimen was fixed with moving a backing
plate in the impedance tube. In details, two condenser microphones
with the separation of 17 cm and 4.5 cm were taken to measure the
acoustic absorption coefficient of 100–800 Hz and 400–2500 Hz, re-
spectively. Then VA-Lab system (BSWA Technology Co., Ltd., Beijing,
China, complying with the standard of ISO 10534-2:2001) was utilized
to fit the data of two frequency range, thus obtain the acoustic ab-
sorption coefficient from 100 to 2500 Hz. These measured results in-
cluding acoustic absorption and mechanical properties were repeated at
least 3 times and the average values were reported.

The schematic illustration of acoustic absorption measurement as

shown in Fig. 3. The test of acoustic absorption coefficient was based on
the method of ASTM E 1050 (Standing Test Method for Impedance and
Absorption of Acoustic Properties Using a Tube, Two Microphones and

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X. Tang et al. Applied Acoustics 134 (2018) 60–68

Fig. 1. (a) Fique fiber samples [25]; (b) Non-

wovens made of jute, banana, bamboo and
polypropylene [20]; (c) and (d) Bark cloth [31];
(e) Various nonwoven fabrics [28]; (f) Luffa fiber
reinforced epoxy composites [30]; (g) and (h)
Coconut and wood fibers [27].

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X. Tang et al. Applied Acoustics 134 (2018) 60–68

Fig. 2. Images of corn field, corn cob and prepared

air-dried corn husk.

Fig. 3. Schematic illustration of acoustic absorption test system with different back cavity and how specimens are set in the impedance tube.

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Fig. 4. (a) Optical image of surface morphology; (b) thickness of corn husk with different layers; (c) and (d) tensile strength and breaking elongation of corn husk in both transverse and
longitudinal directions.

3. Results and discussion

3.1. Mechanical properties of corn husk

Fig. 4(a) shows the surface morphology of original corn husk. The
natural groove structure can be clearly observed from the optical
images. It has been demonstrated that surface groove is beneficial to
improve acoustic absorption properties [32]. Wang and coworkers [17]
reported that groove structure shows much better sound absorbing
capability than the flattest surface, especially when the grove with in-
creased depth and narrow width. Therefore, it can be concluded that
natural corn husk shed bright light as potential acoustic absorption
materials. The thickness of corn husk with different layers was mea-
sured, as shown in Fig. 4(b). Obviously, the thickness of corn husk in-
creased with layers. The values of thickness were 0.652 mm, 1.243 mm,
1.857 mm, 2.368 mm and 2.916 mm when increased from single layer
to 5-layer in sequence. Compared with conventional porous materials,
the thickness of corn husk is thinner, which has unique advantage for
noise reduction applications. Mechanical properties of corn husk were
shown in Fig. 4(c) and (d). The tensile strength was 2.49 MPa and
Fig. 5. Optical images of flexible corn husk in (a) transverse and (b) longitudinal direc-
tions.
5.65 MPa at transverse and longitudinal direction respectively. It was
probably that the fibrous materials in the longitudinal direction can

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X. Tang et al. Applied Acoustics 134 (2018) 60–68

Fig. 6. Acoustic absorption coefficient of corn husk with different back cavity distance (0, 5, 10, 15, 20 and 25 mm).

improve the strength. The breaking elongation was 14.26% and 5.61% of flexural corn husks are shown in Fig. 5. Corn husk has good flexibility
at transverse and longitudinal direction respectively. The higher in both transverse and longitudinal directions. It can be concluded that
breaking elongation in transverse direction can be attributed to the the mechanical properties of corn husk can meet the demand of noise
deformation of groove structure under tensile force. The optical images reduction applications.

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X. Tang et al. Applied Acoustics 134 (2018) 60–68

Table 3
Average acoustic absorption coefficient of single and multi-layer corn husk with different back cavity distance (100–2500 Hz).

d = 0 mm d = 5 mm d = 10 mm d = 15 mm d = 20 mm d = 25 mm

1-Layer 0.158 0.360 0.431 0.418 0.407 0.394

2-Layer 0.306 0.448 0.428 0.407 0.406 0.402
3-Layer 0.429 0.442 0.421 0.404 0.397 0.393
4-Layer 0.417 0.370 0.373 0.347 0.372 0.374
5-Layer 0.409 0.390 0.407 0.409 0.414 0.415

Table 4
Frequency range of acoustic absorption coefficient higher than 0.6 for single and multi-layer corn husk with different back cavity distance.

d = 0 mm d = 5 mm d = 10 mm d = 15 mm d = 20 mm d = 25 mm

1-Layer – 1790–2500 Hz 1176–1984 Hz 1024–1696 Hz 872–1490 Hz 754–1444 Hz

2-Layer 1990–2500 Hz 1248–2178 Hz 1026–1618 Hz 948–1356 Hz 640–1266 Hz 616–1226 Hz
3-Layer 1604–2500 Hz 1078–1850 Hz 904–1460 Hz 598–1166 Hz 558–984 Hz 534–928 Hz
4-Layer 1538–2196 Hz 1130–1526 Hz 876–1150 Hz 660–968 Hz 632–926 Hz 616–910 Hz
5-Layer 1274–1940 Hz 1016–1440 Hz 854–1180 Hz, 2436–2500 Hz 642–948 Hz, 2320–2500 Hz 622–900 Hz, 2192–2500 Hz 570–856 Hz, 2164–2500 Hz

3.2. Effects of multi-layer structure
The acoustic absorption coefficient of corn husk with different
layers was measured and the obtained data as shown in Fig. 6. In this
study, we investigated the acoustic absorption of single layer and multi-
layer corn husk with different back cavity. Under the condition of zero
back cavity distance, the acoustic absorption coefficient increased with
the layer. The average acoustic absorption coefficient was calculated
according to the measured data ranged from 100 to 2500 Hz. The
coefficients of each frequency with 2 Hz interval distance were mea-
sured with the equipment described in section 2.2, and the average
values of test frequency as shown in Table 3. As can be seen from
Table 3, the acoustic absorption coefficient was 0.158, 0.306, 0.429,
0.417 and 0.409 for 1-Layer to 5-Layer respectively. The acoustic ab-
sorption peak moved to low frequency with more layers, as shown in
Fig. 6(a). Similar trend was observed when the tested specimens with
different back cavity distance. It can be seen from Table 4 that the
frequency range of acoustic absorption coefficient higher than 0.6
gradually move to lower frequency with more layers. Especially, the
acoustic absorption properties would be improved when the layer in-
creased from 1-Layer to 2-Layer, for the case of back cavity distance is 0
and 5 mm. With the increased back cavity distance, the difference of
acoustic absorption coefficient between various multi-layer structure
gradually decreased. That is, the increased corn husk can ineffectively
improve acoustic absorption when the back cavity distance is
10–25 mm. Therefore, it can be known that 2-Layer and 3-Layer corn
husk are appropriate for noise reduction.
3.3. Effects of back cavity
The acoustic absorption coefficient of single and multi-layer corn
husk as shown in Fig. 7 and Table 3. Acoustic absorption coefficient is
primitively increased and then decreased with the increase of back
cavity distance for 1-Layer, 2-Layer and 3-Layer samples. However, the
variation of absorption coefficient corresponding to acoustic frequency
is irregular for both 4-Layer and 5-Layer. For different back cavity
distance, most of the values are hovering at the values of 0.4. It should
be particularly noted that acoustic absorption coefficient was greatly
increased from 0.158 to 0.360 for 1-Layer and from 0.306 to 0.448 for
2-Layer, when back cavity distance increased from zero to 5 mm.
However, it is slightly increased from 0.429 to 0.442 for 3-Layer, and
decreased for both 4-Layer and 5-Layer. The results can be attributed to
the presence of air in multi-layer corn husk, which plays the role of
back cavity in acoustic absorption. Furthermore, it can be observed that
acoustic absorption peak gradually moves to lower frequency range
with the increase of back cavity distance. For 1-Layer corn husk, the
acoustic absorption frequency range of coefficient higher than 0.6 is
1790–2500 Hz with 5 mm back cavity distance. However, it move to
1176–1984 Hz when the distance increased to 10 mm, and move to
754–1444 Hz with the distance increased to 25 mm. The acoustic ab-
sorption peak also gradually decreased with the increase of back cavity
distance for multi-layer corn husk. Therefore, it is effective to improve
the acoustic absorption of corn husk at low frequency by increasing the
back cavity distance.
4. Conclusions
In this work, corn husk was extracted from maize in local farmland,
and then air-dried for noise reduction applications. The effects of both
multi-layer structure and back cavity on acoustic absorption were in-
vestigated. The results indicated that corn husk has good acoustic ab-
sorption, which is appropriate for noise reduction. In addition, it is
effective to improve the acoustic absorption at low frequency by in-
creasing back cavity. Compared with commonly used porous materials,
corn husk has the advantage of thinner thickness and lighter weight. It
would be fascinating to see more detailed investigations on the acoustic
properties of corn husk.
Acknowledgment
We are grateful to the hometown of the first author for the maize
used in this study. This research was supported by the Fundamental
Research Funds for the Central Universities (CUSF-DH-D-2017001).

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Fig. 7. (a–e) Acoustic absorption coefficient of corn husk with different layers.
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