Study on Applications of Nanotechnolongy in Bamboo Charcoal Fibre
Nanotechnology (NT) deals with materials from 1 to 100 nm in length. Internationaly, NT is defined as the understanding, manipulation, and control of matter at the length mentioned above, thus, the physical, chemical, and biological properties of the materials (individual atoms, molecules, and bulk matter) can be engineered, synthesized, and altered to develop the next generation of improved materials, devices, structures, and systems. NT at the
molecular level can be used to develop desired textile with special feature, such as high strength, unique surface structure, soft feeling, durability, water resistance, incombustibility, antimicrobial property, and so on. Indeed, NT has created numerous opportunities and challenges in the need of research, by the advancing of the technology in textile industry of China and the importing of bamboo charcoal fibers of nanotechnology from foreign countries.This paper focuses on summarizing recent applications of NT, its characters and functional test for bamboo charcoal fibers.
Introduction
In today's society, environment protection and health have become the pursuit of modern people. Researching and producing textile healthy for human have become a kind of fashion, as a result, functional textile becomes the mainstream in market. Bamboo Charcoal Fibers is a new kind of fibers that uses Nano-Bamboo Charcoal powder, transit distinctive technics and swing in with slice up or filature liquid and spin via filature technics. Bamboo Charcoal Fibers not only have the function to achieve super absorption, deodorization, and moisture absorption for perspiration emitting, heat storing and antimicrobial and mildew resistance, but also have excellent performance regarding infrared ray and anion emission and ultraviolet radiation resistance, etc. Bamboo Charcoal Fibers is praised as "the Black Diamond" in Japan and southeast Asia.
Although the term nanotechnology (NT) is relatively new, the potential theory and technology has a long history, because the term "submicro" has been used in the production of extremely small particles of polymers and copolymers. Today, the technology that deals with the material at the length of 1 to 100 nm (1 billion nm = 1 m) is called NT. In the US and other country, NT is defined as the understanding, manipulation, and control of matter at the length mentioned above, thus, the physical, chemical, and biological properties of materials (individual atoms, molecules, and bulk matter) can be engineered, synthesized, or altered to develop the next generation of improved materials, devices, structures, and systems. In this decade, there will be more advances in NT and it will be widely applicated in the textile industry. Because of its limitless potential in consumeroriented applications, the textile industry is one of the premier beneficiaries of advances in NT. Being one of the largest consumer-oriented industries which has significant impact on national economy, the advances in applications of NT to improve textile properties offer obviously high economic value for the growth of industry. It was demonstrated in recent years that NT can be used to enhance textile attributes, such as fabric softness, durability, and breathability, water resistance, incombustibility, antimicrobial properties in fibers, yarns, and fabrics. Worldwide government funding for research and development in NT was increasing. It is expected that the enhancement of textile materials through the development of NT may evolve into a multi-billion dollar industry with associated
economic and ecologic benefits concerning the textile consumers and society.
1. NT, Improvements in fibre by using NT and Bamboo Charcoal Fibre
The properties and performance of textile fibers are essential to fabric manufacturing and utilization. It is well known that fabrics made of fibers provide desirable properties, such as high absorbency, breathability, and softness to wear comfortably, but the expanded utility of cotton fabrics in certain classical and especially non-classical applications is somewhat limited due to the fiber's relatively low strength, unsatisfied durability, easy creasing, easy soiling, and flammability. On the other hand, fabrics made up with synthetic fibers generally are strong, crease resistant, antimicrobial, and dirt resistant. However, they certainly lack the comfort properties of cotton fabrics. NT induces enticement to develop renovating fibers with the advantages of both cotton and synthetics.
A wide range of fiber size or thickness can be utilized in textile processing (Figure1).
Ordinary and fine-denier textile fibers range from 1 to 100μm in diameter and are produced by established dry-wet-dry, jet melt spinning through spinnerets 1-100 μm in diameter. Nano-fibers of diameters in the nanometer range are mostly manufactured by electro-spinning process, although there are also other methods. Carbon nanotubes (CNT) provide fibers of ultra-high strength and performance. It was shown that superaligned arrays of CNT provide nano-yarns that exhibit Young's modulus in the TPa range, tensile strength equaled 200 GPa, elastic strain up to 5%, and breaking strain of 20%. In electro-spinning, a charged polymer melt or solution is extruded through sub-micrometer diameter spinnerets to afford fibers on a grounded collector plate subjected to high potential difference between the spinnerets and the plate. The process is an established technique to generate fibers of extremely small diameters and enhanced properties. Further enhancement of fiber strength and conductivity is achieved by heat
process. The resulting nano-fibers find applications such as bullet-proof vests and electromagnetic wave-tolerant fabrics. The growing applications of nanotechnologies for special purpose, textile, and related composites certainly have advantages of reinforcing the transverse-surface property of raw materials.
It was discovered that unique composite fibers were made from synthetic nano-fibers obtained through an advanced electro-spinning process, such as the coagulation-based carbon-nano-tube spinning method. These composite fibers facilitate the invention of electronic textiles of super capacitors. During electrospinning process, nano-yarns, comprised of Multi-Walled CNT (MWCNT) that consist of several (usually 7 to 20) concentric cylinders of Single-Walled CNT, can be produced by simultaneous reduction of fiber diameter and increase in twist (up to 1000 times) in the electro-spinning process. These highly twisted yarns facilitate extra strength, toughness, energy-damping capability, etc., and thus can be deployed to produce electronic textiles for supporting multifunctionalities, such as capability for actuation, energy storage capacity, radio or microwave absorption, electrostatic discharge protection, textile heating, or wiring for electronic devices. It is clear that the current development in nano-fibers and nano-yarns will be utilized in producing the next generation textiles, which would be capable of providing radio or microwave absorption, electrostatic discharge protection, textile heating, or wiring for electronic devices of the twenty-first century.
Through changing the surface structures of synthetic fibers, several diverse fiber functionalities can be obtained for profitable exploitation of functional fabrics in special applications. One of the possibilities to develop desired functionality is by embossing the surface of synthetic fibers with nano-structures. Integration of nano-sized antimicrobial particles into textile fibers leads to the development of superior wound dressings. Similarly, by incorporating ceramic nano-particles into a spinning solution, polyimidoamide fibers can be produced in which SiO2 nano-particles are present. Such a "nano-treatment" can also produce antistatic polyacrylonitrile (PAN) fibers consisting of electrically conductive channels, which not only possess antistatic properties but also have good mechanical properties.
Chemical modifications of synthetic fibers using nano-particles can enhance the fibers' porosity and absorption properties, which are useful in producing thermalresistant and flame-resistant fabrics. Desirable thermal properties as well as enhanced fiber tenacity can also be obtained by modifying the surface of the fibers with other (nano-) matters, such as diamine (diaminodiphenyl methane), montmorillonite, and silica nano-particles, etc... Specific functionality in fibers can also be achieved by another leading chemical oxidative deposition technology, which deals with the deposition of Conducting Electro-active Polymers (CEP), that is, polyaniline, polypyrrole, polythiophene, and their derivatives (in nano-form) onto different kinds of synthetic fibers, resulting in special composite fibers with high tensile strength and good thermal stability. Surface polymerization of CEP (by Graft copolymerization) of polymer fibers has a potential to increase the fibers'conductivity almost 10 times by decreasing their electrical resistivity. These socalled coated polymeric composite fibers can be used in microwave attenuation, EMI shielding, and dissipation of static electric charge. They can also be useful in developing fabrics intended for military applications, for example, camouflage, stealth protection, and the like. It may be mentioned that the polymer deposition techniques can be further improved to obtain many other desirable characteristics of CEP coated textiles.
The development of nano-composites usually contains 2 to 5% of nano-fibers. Consequently, the basic properties, fabrication process, and some applications of nano-fibers or nanotubes are mentioned. Some "nano-mechanical" properties of transverse sections of mature and immature cotton fibers have also been investigated and the behavior, properties, and potential applications of these textile micro structures have been studied.
By uniformly dispersing aligned nano-tubes in the polymer matrix, some novel CNT reinforced polymer composite materials have been developed, which can be used for developing multifunctional textiles having superior strength, toughness, lightweight, and high electrical conductivity. By using melt-spinning process, polypropylene/nano-carbon fiber composites with significantly enhanced modulus, compressive strength, and dispersion properties can be produced. The morphology, crystallinity, and several mechanical properties of non-woven mats containing nano-structured poly-capro-lactone (PCL) have also been studied.
Through optimal orientation and crystallization of nano-fibers, excellent properties of composite fibers can be achieved and successfully used for the micro-filtration applications in the medical field. In another recent study, it has been shown that by melt extruding, a range of "nano-additives yarns" of exceptional properties can be produced. Obviously, such a wide range of advances towards the enhancement mechanical properties, surface textures, and fabrication processes of fibers/yarns is expected to lead to the development of the next generation of woven and nonwoven fabrics for thus far unforeseen applications.
2. Category for Nano-Fibers of Bamboo Charcoal, Improved Idiosyncrasy and Test
2.1 Category for Nano- Fibers of Bamboo Charcoal
Theoretically, the nano bamboo charcoal fiber has many kinds, such as the single silk, multi-filament, staple fiber, and it can also be spun with pure cashmere, cotton and others. In China, based on existing document, there are two main ways to produce bamboo charcoal fiber: the first way is to add nano-bamboo charcoal powder during the process of spinning in the spinning solution; the second is to add the established bamboo charcoal composite polymer master-batch in the stage of synthesising fiber. At present, these two important ways of production are adopted mostly to bamboo charcoal-ingredient viscose fiber, polyester fiber, nylon, magnetic fiber and other blended yarn, etc.
Bamboo charcoal viscose fiber can be classified by different purposes such as the filament yarn and staple fiber. By using natural plant cellulose pulp and adding bamboo charcoal micro powder milk dissolved by the solvent, spinning solution is made after defoaming. Fibre spinning is synthesized by spinning pump, extrusion and solidification of coagulating liquid.
In the polyester masterbatch of Bamboo charcoal polyester fiber, Bamboo charcoal content is about 40%.And, according to the different requirements of product, people can add a different ratio of bamboo charcoal polyester Masterbatch to the PET chips, and bamboo charcoal polyester is obtained by spinning. Bamboo Charcoal content is generally 2%~3%, with a maximum of 7%.
By mixing Bamboo Charcoal functional particle of nylon fibers with chips of polyamide 6, we control the ratio between1:5~1:10 to add this mixture in nylon spinning equipment. All the conditions, including screw temperature of 230℃~300℃, melting pressure of 2-6MPa, and spinning speed of 400m/min are needed to synthesize bamboo charcoal nylon.
Bamboo Charcoal Magnetic Fiber Series as healthy products can be "artificially manufactured air-anion" and "painless magnetic therapy", to achieve round-the-clock care.
In order to fully exert Bamboo Charcoal magnetic fiber deodorant, adsorption, antibacterial, launched far-infrared and anions, such as the role of manufacturers can be added in the fiber of a Su-ion reminder effect, so that fibers enhance these effects obviously. By adding anion catalyzer, the amount of anions radiated will be up to 2500-4500 pieces/cm3, and the air condition will be at the same level as in the park or the outskirt. As for auri-Staphylococcus, the antibacterial rate goes beyond 97% by using it. And its far-infrared emissivity is greater than 90%. In addition, bamboo charcoal magnetic fiber has a magnetic health microacupuncture massage function, and solves the problem of abrasion during anion fiber and fabric processing.
Bamboo Charcoal blended yarn mainly consist: Bamboo Charcoal viscose fiber and longstaple cotton (blending long-staple cotton fibers with Bamboo Charcoal modified viscose fiber), bamboo charcoal polyester fiber and PTT fiber (blending 40% ~ 60% of the cross section of PTT bamboo charcoal fiber with Bamboo Charcoal polyester fiber), bamboo charcoal polyester fiber and viscose fiber (blending 1-shaped cross section of Viloft fiber and circular section of Bamboo Charcoal polyester).
2.2 Main Performance of Bamboo Charcoal Nano-Fibers
Nano-particles of bamboo charcoal fiber and particulate bamboo carbon fibers, as well as first-class bamboo charcoal fibers, maintain strong adsorption capacity. Existing Chinese particulate bamboo carbon fiber and imported Nano-bamboo charcoal fiber keeps honeycomb-like porous structure, so it has superior adsorption ability. It plays a significant role in deodorizing the bad odour, formaldehyde, benzene, toluene, ammonia, and many harmful substances. According to some research, bamboo charcoal can adsorb formaldehyde at a of 16% ~ 19.39%; as for benzene, the rate is 8.69% ~ 10.08%; as for toluene ,the rate is 5.65% ~ 8.42%; ammonia with the rate of 22.73% ~ 30.65%; chloroform with the high rate of 40.68%, and the lasting time can be up to 24d. And in the drop-off of bamboo charcoal fiber, the content of carbon is nearly 93% ~ 96%, and this property enable it to adsorb sulfur-based compounds, nitrogen-based compounds and so on.
Second, it has good per for manceinanti-fluff, anti-pilling. Bamboo Charcoal Fiber can reach level 3.5 ~ level 4.5 as for the anti- fluff, anti-pilling effect.
Then, its far-infrared radiation property is obvious. Bamboo charcoal fiber can absorb and rer adiation8- l4 μm far-infrared. Because bamboo charcoal fiber contains metal elements such as potassium, magnesium, calcium carbonized material (K 0.85, Na 0.01, Ca 0.05, Mg 0.04, Fe 0.01, Mn 0.05), fibers and fabrics have the property of far-infrared radiation. The human body can absorb the far-infrared spectroscopy, which can be absorbed by the body easily to activate human cells, increase cellular energy, accelerate the speed of blood circulation, promote and improve body metabolism.
Fourth, this material washes well. Bamboo charcoal fibers Express is easy to dry after being washed, and it keeps this property all the time.
Fifth, it regulates the balance of moisture. Microporous structure of bamboo charcoal and fiber honeycomb micropore structure with automatic adsorption and moisture regulating properties of natural balance.
Sixth, the anion launch function. Bamboo Charcoal fiber containing potassium, calcium and other minerals, and the launch of negative ions, is at a high level which is equivalent to the anion concentration of the outskirts, and this is beneficial for people's health.
Seventh, antimicrobial function. Bamboo Charcoal fiber keeps the property to decompose the micro-organisms attached to its surface, and it can effectively break down the harmful substances in the air as well. American Association for Testing and Materials ASTME2149-2001 fixation antibacterial activity of antibacterial agents dynamic testing method is adopted to study Staphylococcus aureus ATCC6538 (gram-positive bacteria). And by testing the one-sided knitted fabric bamboo charcoal filament bacteriostatic antibacterial function, the results show that the inhibiting rate is 65%, antimicrobial rate is 84%.
2.3 Bamboo Charcoal fiber Test
About the test of bamboo charcoal polyester knitted fabric moisture deodorant, with bamboo charcoal polyester cotton (50/50) blended yarn woven into the socks to wear test the actual goods, wearing a week without washing, socks not only have no odor, but also very dry, It is means that the function of bamboo charcoal polyester of adsorption deodorant, moisture absorption and drying function is very excellent. The test specimen parameters as follow, raw materials: 8.3tex/72f (75D/72 f) bamboo charcoal polyester filament; longitudinal density: 152 bar/5cm; landscape orientation density: 92 longitudinal/5cm; Thickness: 0.44mm; Weight: 130g/m.
About the test of the function of Bamboo Charcoal fiber far-infrared radiation, Test parameters of pure bamboo charcoal polyester knitted fabric and bamboo charcoal polyester wool (30/70) blended knitted,the far-infrared emissivity as follow, temperature: 25℃, wave-length: 8-14um, normal force launch rate: pure bamboo charcoal polyester knitted fabric is 86.9%,bamboo charcoal polyester wool (30/70) blended knitted is 90.0%. It can be seen that the far-infrared emissivity of both is high the function of store up heat and warm-keeping is better.
About the test of adsorption properties of bamboo charcoal fiber, bamboo charcoal polyester knits can adsorb sulfenyl compounds (hydrogen sulfide, methyl mercaptan, ethyl mercaptan, etc.) and amido compounds (contains nitrogen compounds and amines compounds). Through the test of the ammonia adsorption of 18.7g of bamboo charcoal polyester knitted fabric to test its adsorption function, the result is that the ammonia can be adsorbed by 13% for about 5min, and about 25% for 20 minutes.
About the lead wet performance testing of Bamboo Charcoal fiber, send these Bamboo Charcoal fibers that have been treated by hydrophile and untreated by hydrophile to have a relativity test on the lead wet performance. From the table 1, it can be seen that the lead wet performance of the Bamboo Charcoal fiber that treated by the hydrophilic is better than that untreated by hydrophilic.
About the test of anti-bacterial properties of bamboo charcoal fiber, the micro-organisms adhere to charcoal surface decompose those micro-organisms that adhere to themselves. By the anti-bacterial properties test of bamboo charcoal fiber testing, sterilization rate of bamboo charcoal polyester knits is 0, inhibition rate is 65%, it means that bamboo charcoal polyester knitted fabric don't have bactericidal properties, but has some antibacterial properties.
About anion emission properties test of bamboo charcoal fiber, the experimentation use the determinator with IC-1000 anion concentration to test its emission measure, the emission measure of bamboo charcoal polyester fabric is 4520/cm3, bamboo charcoal polyester and wool (30/70) blend fabric is 6030/cm3. The evaluation criteria of Nano Bamboo Charcoal Fibers anions can be showed in table 2.
3. Home and abroad market and consumer's cognize of Nano finish machining fabric
3.1 Evolution of Nano-Fibers of Bamboo Charcoal
Bamboo Charcoal that was used to produce Fibre begin with the mid-nineties of last century, it is the products of Bamboo and its surplusage that pass by pyrogenetic decomposition. In the oversea country, just a little country study the Bamboo Charcoal, Japan, South Korea, Indonesia are the main countries. The function improve of Bamboo Charcoal first been developed in Japan. In 2005, Japanese natural science journal said their country have produced Bamboo Charcoal Fibre of 500nm.
China has started produce Fibre with Bamboo Charcoal in 1995. At the beginning of 1997, ZheJiang WenZhao Bamboo Charcoal Limited Corporation developed Bamboo Charcoal products that used to fill in fabric products; In 2003, Bamboo Charcoal viscose fibre was developed by HeNan XinXiangBaiLu chemical fiber group, this fiber was made as follow step: send Bamboo Charcoal Nano micro powder that made of southern high quality bamboo into the viscose fiber. At the same year HuaDong Science and engineering university's ShangHai HuaLiShuoFei science and technology corporation developed a new kind of Bamboo Charcoal fibre. The fibers are coated with a fiber surface in natural additives processed from ultrafine charcoal. In 2005, BeiJing BaiQuan chemical fiber factory developed bamboo charcoal fiber with magnetic. In 2006, ZheJiang ShangYuHongQiang color polyester limited corporation developed multi-functional environment-friendly bamboo charcoal fiber from more than 5-year-old bamboo that these bamboo through high-temperature moment of pure oxygen and nitrogen production of new technology barrier microcharcoal particles.
From 2004, China Taiwan region was also reported that they have made new type bamboo charcoal fiber. Taiwan Textile Center uses nano-technology to turn bamboo charcoal into powder, then through the melt spinning process made charcoal evenly into the polyester fiber, Finally they get bamboo charcoal fiber. As Taiwan is often affected by typhoon, Bamboo in Taiwan is relatively resilient, fibrous tissue within more porous, structure is more dense than Chinese Mainland, and many porosity, mineral-rich, quality and performance are quite good.
3.2 The contrast of Nano-Fibers of Bamboo Charcoal between home and abroad
Because of the development of Bamboo Charcoal fiber is very late in China, so there are just a little corporations produce this products, such as TangShan ShanYou group, HangZhou BiaoFa chemical fiber limited corporation, ShangHai JieRunSi science and technology limited corporation, XaMeng JunLiDe group. Most products are Bamboo charcoal blended staple fiber and polyester fiber-based in Chinese Mainland. But specifications are limited, such as Polyester DTY 75D/72F, 75D/36F, 150D/144F.Nano Bamboo Charcoal Products of them are black charcoal and gray charcoal.
There are many kinds of bamboo charcoal fiber in China Taiwan region, and there are many business offices in Chinese Mainland, such as ShangHai NanDe textile limited corporation, WuXi BaiHe weaving Limited Corporation. Bamboo charcoal polyester fiber, bamboo charcoal nylon fiber, the specifications are diverse. such as Polyester75D/72F,150D/144F, 50D/36F, Nylon 70D/48F and 40D/10F, Nano Bamboo Charcoal Products of them are black charcoal, gray charcoal and white charcoal.
3.3 China and Japan: a Contrast of Production Process
Chinese enterprises currently use kiln firing charcoal, this method have characteristics such as low investment and large volume and fruitful. But in the firing process, it is judged by the operators' eyes and nasal, resulting in poor stability of bamboo charcoal, the differences between qualities is large. At the same time, there are problems like oxidation, low-carbon, a long production cycle. Furthermore, using different earth kiln will result in differences bamboo charcoal, and there are many differences in their performance, especially absorbability. It is reported that the charcoal made by high-temperature carbonization can bring good quality and stability, shorten the production cycle, but the equipments are relatively expensive. Currently there are few companies using such equipments. Suichang and Quzhou, Zhejiang province mostly use earth kiln to produce bamboo charcoal.
Industry Analysis of Japan's vehicle-mounted carbonization furnace, this kind of carbonization Room in Japan is welded with steel and external coating refractory material, filled with exhaust gas which has been fully burnt in combustion chamber to heat the bamboo, at the first half time, the bamboo vinegar should be reclaimed by condenser and heated by the high temperature (350-400°c) caused by wood tar. The bamboo vinegar that produced from bamboo should be condensation and reclaimed by Coolers. A few hours later, stop burning in combustion chamber after the bamboo vinegar stopped, and add some air into carbonization Room, the bamboo material start self-ignite and the temperature gets rising. When the temperature in carbonization room reaches 750-800, carbonization is over, stop the air filling, and let the material naturally cool down. Typically, one cycle of burning in such carbonization furnace is 6-8h (when temperature is higher than 400°c is 3-4h), the natural cooling costs half a day. While the kiln cycle often need cost seven days, and some even takes 15-22 days.
3.4 Scientific research of Bamboo Charcoal Fibers industry in our country is comparatively lag
Bamboo charcoal fibre industry is a burgeoning textile industry and exists less than ten years in China, this industry mainly developed from traditional charcoal manufacture, so the technical level is low. The technical research of bamboo charcoal fibre industry is comparatively lag at present time and is still in the elementary phase, although hundreds of products' series have been developed.
For most products, people just know the efficacy, but the application mechanism and physical, chemical performance and research of fine products all still need to be further improved in depth. Domestic companies don't have any test or analysis report on the performance of Bamboo charcoal fibre products, so the description of the function is comparatively deficiency. (Such as table 3).
Taiwan is relatively more matured in research and application of nano technology bamboo charcoal fibre, take Taiwan Taihua as the example, whose products' feature is given in table 4:
3.5 Cognize degree of home and abroad market
At present, the research and development of bamboo charcoal fiber are just developed in Japan, South Korea, and some other countries and regions. According to the survey CCTV, the majority of domestic consumers are not aware of bamboo charcoal textile products, and a small number of consumers do not fully understand
the use of bamboo charcoal fiber although they are aware of the importance of these products. Through visits to league stores(franchised shops), we have found that customers are not as many as expected, most of them are young people, and some buy these products out of curiosity, some on the field research after hearing product performance, so that the number of relatively fixed customers is quite small.
Yiwu City is the largest underwear production base in China, taking up 80% of circular robotization knitting machines in China and 1/5 in the world. Recently, some Nano Bamboo Charcoal fiber was imported from Taiwan, and processed into knitted underwear and basically sold to Canada, France, the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal and Slovenia etc. It seems that there is not good domestic market for it, the main reason lies in the fact that the local consumers are given enough promotion to raise their awareness of products. Economic benefit is the final goal for industrial development, also is the power for promoting industrial development and expansion, but the inefficient marketing and weak publicity will affect the development of Chinese bamboo charcoal industries.
4. Conclusion
All the study above shows that we must enhance research level for a robotized production of Nano-fibers as requested by the new roadmap for textile industry, including technology research with Molecular nanotechnology of Bamboo Charcoal Fibers, and electronic filature and finish machining fabric. We should pay attention to deep process, develop new product, and added value of finished goods by chemistry technology. We need walk a path that government support industry, correlative department assist industry to research & design and government develop with enterprise together. We can make use of particles technology of Bamboo Charcoal Fibers of our country to assimilate Nanotechnology of abroad textile. We will expand Nano-Fibers application for Life Sciences and Healthcare, Military and Defense, Construction, Clothing, Household Care. By doing so, we will be able to guide consumer's buying behavior, and promote market demand for nano-fiber products for a vigorous growth of our textile industry.
If the information technology (IT) is the wave of the present, the nanotechnology (NT) is certainly the wave of the future. NT has been growing by leaps and bounds in the last decade. It has numerous applications in almost every major industry, including textiles. There is a considerable potential for profitable applications of NT in cotton and other textile industries. Its application can economically extend the properties, performance, and hence values of textile processing and products.
Predominantly cotton fabrics may efficiently be made flame retardant, shrink proof, crease resistant, water and stain resistant, and even water repellant, while still maintaining the cotton's advantage, excellent comfort character, and aesthetics.
By deploying NT, ultra-strong, durable, and specific-function-oriented fabrics can be efficiently produced for a number of end-use applications, including medical, industrial, military, domestic, apparel, household furnishing, and much more. Now it is conceivable that by combining the optical fibers, micro mirrors, functional coatings, and electronics, customized fabrics and garments can be developed, which will change their colors as per the consumer's desire and taste. The textile industry certainly has the biggest customer base in the world. Therefore, the advances in the customer-oriented products will be the main focus of future NT applications, and the textile industry is expected to be one of the main beneficiaries. Anyway there certainly have some limitations and unknown health risks pertaining on the rapid development and growth of NT and their end-use products. For example, it is extremely difficult and complex to process carbon fibers of < 200 nm relative to traditional textile practices and procedures. Regarding safety of person involved in production, conversion and even use of nano-fibers and their products, we still do not know any of short-term or long-term about unknown health risks, especially the probable risks of pulmonary diseases due to the "nano-size" of the particles involved. Our government quality inspection department also should put the risk of this impact, and unfold the test technology research of Nanotechnology Bamboo Charcoal Fibers, yarn and textile to upgrade globe industry value chain, and develop vigorously China's tradition textile industry, and boost up competition capability of export at international market. No doubt about it!
Source form China Textile Magazine
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