With growing environmental/ecological issues owing to the utilization of petroleum-based compounds, the preparation of fine chemicals and functional biodegradable compounds with safety hazards from natural and sustainable resources is of excellent public value [[1], [2], [3], [4], [5]]. Polysaccharides, sustainable and eco-friendly organic biopolymers, are naturally produced by living organisms, including plants, animals, algae, and microorganisms, and used as raw materials for various applications [[5], [6], [7], [8], [9]]. Among polysaccharides, cellulose is an abundant natural resource in the biosphere utilized as a biogenic raw material with attractive structure and properties for various value-added, biomass compounds with an annual production of 7.5 × 1010 tons [[10], [11], [12], [13]].

Cellulose and its derivatives are of special attention as environment-friendly alternatives for versatile applications in a wide range of medical, pharmaceutical, biofuel, bio-derived, and specialty chemicals/compounds [[13], [14], [15], [16]]. Cellulose-based compounds find application in many interdisciplinary topics, owing to their enthralling chemical structure and unique features, including high biodegradability/biocompatibility, affordability, renewability, non-toxicity, low density, simplicity of manufacture, high specific surface area, environmental protection, antibacterial activities, etc. (Fig. 1) [[15], [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23]]. These naturally derived (nano)materials, which are either separated from plants or chemically generated in a lab, also have exceptional properties, including reinforcing capabilities, high mechanical strength, and adjustable self-assembly in aqueous solution arising from their high degree of crystallinity, unique shape/size, surface chemistry, and abundant hydroxyl groups [22,23]. Cellulose-based natural biomaterials, for example, cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs), cellulose microfibrils, cellulose nanofibrils (CNFs), bacterial cellulose (BC), and cellulose nanocomposite have recently found several applications in biomedicine, pharmaceutics, electronics, fuel cells, environmental remediation, paper industry, optoelectronics, sensors, food packaging, and engineering applications among other industries, as shown in Fig. 1 [5,13,16,[19], [20], [21], [22], [23], [24], [25], [26], [27], [28], [29], [30], [31], [32], [33], [34], [35], [36]]. In addition, cellulose and its derivatives are applied in other sophisticated applications in modern periods [[37], [38], [39], [40]]. Thus, to use the exceptional features and perceive the full potential of these beneficial polysaccharides, efforts are being made to derivatize and modify them.

Recently, (nano)science and/or (nano)technology has been shifting more towards green, natural product resources and reusable (nano)catalysts [[41], [42], [43]]. In this respect, polysaccharides are suitable candidates to explore for supported heterogeneous catalysis [[44], [45], [46], [47], [48], [49]]. Among polysaccharides, cellulose is a principally interesting biomaterial, with an outstanding range of applications in various shapes or dimensions such as adsorbents, energy storage, biosensors, membranes, and as a natural support for the heterogenization of homogeneous catalysts [11,15,19,26,[50], [51], [52], [53], [54], [55], [56], [57], [58], [59], [60], [61], [62]]. In addition, cellulose can be extensively applied to prepare biopolymeric composites and blends owing to its fascinating mechanical properties, wide abundance, and environmentally benign nature. In the preparation process of composites/blends or membranes/films containing cellulose, this biopolymer has a crucial role as a matrix, filler, or support for the synthesis of various catalysts [1,11,15,19,26,[63], [64], [65], [66], [67], [68], [69], [70], [71], [72], [73], [74]].

Among available options, surface-functionalized or modified natural and bio-based polymers have attracted much attention in the useful generation processes [20,23,24,36,[75], [76], [77], [78]]. Functionalized cellulose is an ideal adsorbent or catalyst due to its low cost, improved physicochemical properties, and abundance relative to commercial adsorbents/catalysts [[79], [80], [81], [82], [83], [84], [85], [86], [87], [88]]. Since unmodified cellulose lacks certain features to be utilized as an effective biomaterial, such as variable physical stabilities and low catalytic/adsorption capacities [89], surface engineering via chemical modification/functionalization has been investigated in recent years [20,23,24,36,[79], [80], [81], [82], [83], [84], [85], [86], [87], [88]]. Generally, chemical, biochemical, and mechanical approaches provide routes to modify/functionalize cellulose, introducing either charged or hydrophobic moieties, yielding improved features such as high flexibility, flame retardancy, and transparency, as well as significantly expanding traditional applications of wood, cotton, etc. [[79], [80], [81], [82], [83], [84], [85], [86], [87], [88], [89], [90]]. There are different nanocellulose surface modification processes such as amidation, silylation, etherification, epoxidation, esterification, polymerization, phosphorylation, sulfonation, and carboxymethylation to improve (nano)cellulose compatibility [15,16,20,[91], [92], [93], [94]]. These modification/functionalization techniques offer the versatile potential of cellulose as a natural biopolymer in the preparation of efficient and recyclable support-based catalysts, adsorbents, membranes, fuel cells, drug/enzyme/gene delivery carriers, etc. Indeed, researchers can attempt to fabricate novel functionalized cellulose-based bio(nano)materials via these modification techniques; especially sulfonation reactions, to improve/tailor its physicochemical/biochemical properties and potential applications.

In the field of cellulose studies, several reports are available on the preparation of cellulose hydrogels, composites containing cellulose, modifications, and their biomedical or biodiesel production applications [16,23,36,84,90,[93], [94], [95], [96], [97], [98], [99], [100], [101]]. However, the lack of reports regarding the synthesis, structure, and potential applications of sulfonic acid functionalized cellulose-based (nano)materials, in various shapes (such as hydrogels, membranes, biofilms, catalysts, and (nano)composites), inspired us to carry out this study. A series of thoughts and approaches to the design and application of recyclable functionalized cellulose-inspired (nano)catalysts for efficient production, environmental remediation, and valorization reactions have been provided. Herein, sulfonated cellulose, cellulose-based copolymers, and cellulose-based (nano)composites to use in the biological, adsorption, fuel cell, and catalytic (nano)technologies, are discussed in separate sections.