Development of a Sustainable Coated Textile (Fabric) or Biocomposite Using a Combination of Fibrous Materials (Plant-based fibres and Agricultural and

开发可持续涂层纺织品（织物）或生物复合材料，使用纤维材料（植物纤维和农业和家禽废物纤维）和工业和医疗应用的聚合物的组合。合成聚合物或塑料提供了许多独特的优点，如可用性，高强度和重量轻，这导致塑料在生活的各个方面的应用扩展。但塑料也有主要的缺点，如不可生物降解性，缺乏可持续和环保的合成和加工系统，泄漏问题等，这使得大多数廉价的合成聚合物不适合在工业和医疗领域的应用。为了解决这一问题，人们尝试了天然生物聚合物，但不同的聚合物存在可加工性差、价格高等问题。这些问题导致在各种应用中使用纤维增强复合结构（由不同的聚合物和纤维材料制成）。因此，拟议的研究旨在调查涂层纺织品或复合结构的发展，这些结构可以取代工业（包装）和医疗（外科和卫生）部门的合成产品。第二个目标是确保产品在生产过程和产品本身方面的可持续性。这项工作将涉及不同的原材料，同时需要一些特殊的机器来开发所需的结构。详情如下。原料：采用天然纤维作为非织造结构的主要原料。对于树脂，将从几种选择中选择最合适的一种来制备树脂。如果需要，天然粘合剂可以粘合纤维并在纤维和树脂之间形成键。可能需要额外的化学物质来赋予织物一些其他所需的性能（软化/改善疏水性/改善机械性能/改善柔韧性等）。机器：将需要一个非织造布装置（实验室规模）从纤维中生产非织造布。化学实验室中使用的标准设备足以对树脂进行化学改性。在开发部分的最后一部分，将使用织物涂布机（实验室规模）。但是，也可以使用手动应用粘合剂和涂层材料。这项研究将从纤维收集开始。在转化为所需的织物之前，纤维必须经过常规工艺（清洁，冲刷等），然后再进行涂层。如果需要，在涂布前将粘合剂涂在织物表面。但在这种情况下，粘合剂的粘度需要保持在较低的区域，以确保在纤维内部和进入纤维。通常情况下，涂层会比粘合剂具有更大的粘度。将对涂层聚合物进行化学修饰，或指定不同聚合物的组合（取决于最终产品的要求）以获得最佳涂层效果。涂层应用后，织物将经过适当的固化过程，然后进行不同的特性测试。拟议的研究领域涵盖工程和物理科学领域，这是EPSRC的职权范围。具体来说，拟议的研究涉及纺织和生物材料化学，使用先进技术和仪器的材料调查。

Development of a Sustainable Coated Textile (Fabric) or Biocomposite Using a Combination of Fibrous Materials (Plant-based fibres and Agricultural and Poultry waste fibres) and Polymers for Industrial and Medical Applications.Synthetic polymers or plastics offer a number of unique advantages such as availability, high strength, and lightweight, which have led to the expansion of plastic applications in every aspect of life. But plastics also have major disadvantages such as non-biodegradability, lack of sustainable and eco-friendly synthesis and processing systems, leakage problems, etc., which make most cheap synthetic polymers unsuitable for applications in the industrial and medical sectors. To solve the problem, natural biopolymers have been tried, but different polymers have different problems like poor processability, high price, etc. These problems lead to the use of fibre-reinforced composite structures (made of different polymers and fibrous materials) in various applications. Therefore, the proposed research aims to investigate the development of coated textiles or composite structures that could replace synthetic products in the industrial (packaging) and medical (surgical and hygiene) sectors. The secondary aim is to ensure the sustainability of the product in terms of the production process and the product itself.The work will involve different raw materials, while some special machines would be required for developing the required structure. Details on them are given below. Raw Materials: Natural fibre would be taken as the main raw material for the nonwoven structure. For the resin, the most suitable one from several options will be taken to prepare the resin. A natural adhesive may bind the fibres and form bonds between the fibres and resin if required. Additional chemicals may be required to impart some other required properties (softening/improving hydrophobicity/improving mechanical properties/improving flexibility, etc.,) to the fabric. Machines:A nonwoven fabric setup (laboratory scale) will be required to produce the nonwoven sheet from the fibres. Standard equipment used in a chemistry laboratory would be sufficient for the chemical modification of the resin. In the last segment of the development part, a fabric coating machine (laboratory scale) will be used. However, manual application of adhesive and coating material too could be used.The research will be started with fibres collection. The fibers will have to go through routine processes (cleaning, scouring, etc.) before being converted into the required fabric sheet and the coating would be applied afterward. The adhesive would be applied to the fabric surface if required before applying the coating. But in that case, the viscosity of the adhesive would be required to be kept in the lower region to ensure penetration within and into the fibres. Normally, the coating would have more viscosity than the adhesive. Chemical modifications would be done to the coating polymer, or a combination of different polymers would be specified (depending on the requirements of the end products) to get the best result from the coating. After the application of the coating, the fabrics will go through proper curing processes before being taken to different characterisation tests.The proposed area of research covers the area of engineering and physical sciences, which is the remit of the EPSRC. Specifically, the proposed research involves textile and biomaterial-based chemistry, investigation of materials using advanced techniques and instrumentation.