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Aimplas develops composites with natural flax fibres

10 Jun '15

2 min read

Aimplas, the plastics technology centre in Spain, has completed the research developed in the framework of the project Fibragen, in order to develop a new generation of composites reinforced with natural fibres of improved properties.

In the research conducted, several flax crops have been bred during 2012 and 2013 for their analysis and selection, all together with other centres and European universities.

Different varieties of flax have been used for breeding. Researchers have kept in mind some aspects such as the place, land, season of the year, moisture, and temperature in order to analyze if the variables affect the properties of the plants and at the same time to select those who present better mechanical properties, Aimplas said on its website.

The project was undertaken without the techniques used until now for the improvement of the natural fibres’ properties as a reinforcement of composites. It did not allow the incorporation of additives and processes used when removing moisture that is identified when obtaining optimal fibres as reinforcement. Besides, the knowledge of those crop conditions and parameters help to stimulate the plants’ gene expression that improves determined properties, such as mechanical, thermal, bacteria and microorganism resistance, adhesion, etc., in order to get materials composed with more controlled properties and less variability.

The participation of Aimplas in the project has mainly consisted in the adaptation of the different varieties of flax harvested for their processing in the correspondent composites and also in the analysis of the mechanical properties of the products that include these flax fibres as reinforcement. (GK)

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