Treatments of non-wood plant fibres used as reinforcement in composite materials

Abstract

During last three decades, the global need for affordable housing has stimulated extensive research on cementitious matrix composites 1-18. Different groups in tropical regions have conducted an important effort on the study of cementitious composite materials reinforced with vegetable fibres 1-6,12,16. Indeed, vegetable fibres offer a cheap and sustainable approach that can be used to reduce the overall cost of construction materials and electricity consumption. The goal for developing such alternative technologies is to promote sustainable building materials. Brazilian and Guadeloupean research groups have accumulated important knowledge on tropical vegetable fibres. This fundamental knowledge on non wood tropical plants can be useful for numerous applications such as fibre cement, green composites, particle boards and papermaking 5,19-24. The fibre reinforcement is necessary to improve mechanical properties of a given building material, which would be otherwise unsuitable for practical applications. A major advantage concerning fibre reinforcement of a brittle material (e.g., cement paste, mortar or concrete) is the composite behavior after cracking. Post-cracking toughness enhanced by fibres in the material may allow large-scale construction use of such composites 21. There are two approaches for the development of new composites. The first one is based on the production of thin flat or corrugated sheets of asbestos-free fibre cement. These components are produced by wellknown industrialscale processes such as Hatschek or other similar methods commercially used with high acceptance for building

Manufacture and characterisation of short fibre biocomposites

“…Note that the cover layer seemed to have been dissolved in certain zones more than others, which created a pattern. This phenomenon has been previously observed in other studies [Alvarez and Vázquez, 2006, Arsène et al, 2013, Martins et al, 2006.…”

“…These scenarios depend on the column dimension, the sample porosity, the packing homogeneity and the flow rate [Thielmann, 2004]. Natural fibre pore widths range from micrometers down to a few nanometers [Arsène et al, 2013, Stone and Scallan, 1965 and so these exceed in size the elutant molecules (cross sectional area ca. 10 A 2 to 100Å 2 [Perry et al, 1997]).…”

Impact of Alkaline Hornification in Jute Fibers on the Tensile Strength

“…This increment for jute fiber was 70% in the max load, 176% in the tensile strength, 133% in the strain and 9% to the Young's modulus. As described in the literature [7][8] these kind of treatment removes partially the lignin and hemicelluloses from the fibers, leaving the cellulose, which is the crystalline phase and more resistant mechanically. Moreover, the lignin and hemicelluloses removal results in a reduction of fiber diameter, increasing their aspect ratio (length/ diameter) and contributing to the improvement of the mechanical resistance.…”

“…If the alkali concentration and/or exposition are higher than the optimum, the excess delignification of the fiber can take place, which results in weakening or damaging the fibers. Treated fibers have lower lignin content, a partial reduction of wax and oil cover materials and distension of crystalline cellulose order [7][8].…”

The nanobiocomposites synthesis from biomass and its characterization

“…HCell structure seems to be strongly damaged after alkali pretreatment (Figure 2c). The rough surface may be preferred as it increases adhesion in the composite matrix [47].…”