Abstract Due to fiber swelling, textile fabrics containing hygroscopic fibers tend to decrease pore size under wet or increasing humidity and moisture conditions, the reverse being true. Nevertheless, for personal thermal regulation and comfort, the opposite is desirable, namely, increasing the fabric pore size under increasing humid and sweating conditions for enhanced ventilation and cooling, and a decreased pore size under cold and dry conditions for heat retention. This paper describes a novel approach to create such an unconventional fabric by emulating the structure of the plant leaf stomata by designing a water responsive polymer system in which the fabric pores increase in size when wet and decrease in size when dry. The new fabric increases its moisture permeability over 50% under wet conditions. Such a water responsive fabric can find various applications including smart functional clothing and sportswear. Graphical Abstract
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This content will become publicly available on January 1, 2026
A facile biomass-based coating for flax fabric toward plant fiber/biobased epoxy composite with enhanced fire safety
The natural abundance, biodegradability, and low density of plant 昀椀bers, together with biobased epoxy thermoset
resin, have driven the increasing popularity of plant 昀椀ber/polymer composites (PFRPs) to wider applications
in various industries. However, the striving for biomass-based 昀氀ame retardants (FRs) treatment for PFRPs
remained a bottleneck due to polymers’ inherent vulnerability against 昀椀re and the increasing environmental
awareness. In this work, a facile two-step aqueous solution coating process was proposed for fabric surface
treatment of 昀氀ax fabric using fully biobased phytic acid and chitosan from polysaccharides. The treated 昀氀ax
fabric demonstrated self-extinguishing behavior when ignited and showed a decrease in peak heat release rate
(PHRR) by 58% under combustion. The laminate produced by this treated 昀氀ax fabric and biobased epoxy resin
showed a decrease of PHRR by 36% and an increase of more than 200% for the time of torch 昀椀re burn-through,
demonstrating intriguing 昀氀ame retardance brought by only FRs treatment on 昀氀ax fabric reinforcements. Various
measurements were done to elaborate on the role of treated 昀氀ax fabric in the 昀氀ame retardancy of polymer composites.
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- Award ID(s):
- 2153316
- PAR ID:
- 10556412
- Publisher / Repository:
- elsevier
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Polymer Degradation and Stability
- Volume:
- 231
- Issue:
- C
- ISSN:
- 0141-3910
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 111057
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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