Module 6: Fibre Yielding Plants PDF

UNIVESITY OF THE CORDILLERAS COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES - BS BIOLOGY MODULE 6: FIBRE YIELDING PLANTS Learning objectives: 1. Discuss some of the common fibre-yielding plants and their uses 2. Understand the importance of fibre-yielding plants in the te...

UNIVESITY OF THE CORDILLERAS COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES - BS BIOLOGY MODULE 6: FIBRE YIELDING PLANTS Learning objectives: 1. Discuss some of the common fibre-yielding plants and their uses 2. Understand the importance of fibre-yielding plants in the textile industry 3. Discuss the economic and social impacts on local communities and the environment 4. Demonstrate the process of extracting fibers from plants Course outline: I. Natural fiber A. Natural fiber 1. Vegetable 2. Seed 3. Fruit 4. Bast B. Animal fiber C. Mineral fiber II. Man-made fiber A. Regenerated B. Synthetic C. Inorganic III. Types of fiber IV. Importance V. Extraction process FIBERS Fiber or fibre is a natural man-made substance that is significantly longer than wide. Fibers are often used in the manufacture of other materials. The strongest engineering materials often incorporate fibers (e.g., carbon fiber and ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene). Compared to natural fibers, synthetic fibers can often be produced very cheaply in large amounts compared to natural fibers. Still, natural fibers can provide some benefits, such as comfort, over synthetic counterparts in clothing. I. Natural Fiber Natural fibers are fibers produced by geological processes or from the bodies of plants or animals. They can be used as a component of composite materials, where the orientation of fibers impacts the properties. Natural fibers can also be matted into sheets to make paper or felt. The earliest evidence of humans using fibers is the discovery of wool and dyed flax fibers found in a prehistoric cave in the Republic of Georgia that dates back to 36,000 BP. Natural fibers can be used for high-tech applications like automobile composite parts. Compared to composites reinforced with glass fibers, composites with natural fibers have lower density, better thermal insulation, and reduced skin irritation. Further, unlike glass fibers, natural fibers can be broken down by bacteria once they are no longer used. Natural fibers are good sweat absorbents and can be found in various textures. Cotton fibers made from the cotton plant, for example, produce fabrics that are light in weight, soft in texture, and can be  UNIVESITY OF THE CORDILLERAS COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES - BS BIOLOGY made in various sizes and colours. Clothes made of natural fibers such as cotton are often preferred over clothing made of synthetic fibers by people living in hot and humid climates. A. VEGETABLE 1. LEAF FIBERS Leaf fibers or hard fibers are a type of plant fiber mainly used for cordage (producing rope). They are the toughest of the plant fibers, most likely due to their increased lignin content compared to the other plant fibers. They are typically characterized as tough and rigid, lending them to being used in rope production over clothing or paper like other plant fibers. Leaf fibers can be found in the vascular bundles of plant leaves and, therefore, consist of phloem and xylem tissues and other vascular sheathing tissues (for example, sclerenchyma cells). More specifically, leaf fibers are typically found in monocotyledonous leaves. The fibers are harvested from plants in long, thin bundles, mainly through decortication, where the non- fibrous tissues are scraped away from the plant fibers by hand or in a machine. For most cases, the leaves must be hand-picked from the plant at maturity before undergoing decortication, which causes the harvesting of hard fibers to be a very energy and time-intensive task. Sisal and abaca are the primary leaf fibers that are harvested and sold. These are both mainly used to make rope or matting, but as technology advances, these and other hard fibers can be broken down and pulped to be used in paper products. Not much research is being looked into the possibilities and abilities of leaf fibers as they are very hard to harvest and process, so synthetic fibers are more commonly used in their place a. Abaca (Manila Hemp) - Cordage Abacá, binomial name Musa textilis, is a species of banana native to the Philippines, grown as a commercial crop in the Philippines, Ecuador, and Costa Rica. The plant, also known as Manila hemp, has great economic importance. It is harvested for its fiber, extracted from the leaf stems. Abacá is also the traditional source of lustrous This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed fiber hand-loomed into various Indigenous textiles in the under CC BY Philippines, such as talk and colonial-era sheer luxury fabrics known as nips. They are also the source of fibers for sinamay, a loosely woven stiff material used for textiles and traditional Philippine millinery. b. Piña Piña is a traditional Philippine fiber made from the pineapple plant leaves. Pineapples have been widely cultivated in the Philippines since the 17th century for weaving lustrous lace-like luxury textiles known as nipis fabric. The name is derived from Spanish piña, meaning "pineapple". In February 2018, the National Commission for Culture and the Arts and the government of Aklan began nominating Kalibo piña weaving to the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage List. Since piña is from a leaf, the leaf has to be cut first from the plant. Then, the fiber is pulled or split away from the leaf. Most leaf fibers are long and somewhat stiff. Each strand of the piña fiber is hand-scraped and knotted one by one to form a continuous filament to be hand-woven and then made into a piña cloth. c. Sisal – Cordage, matting  UNIVESITY OF THE CORDILLERAS COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES - BS BIOLOGY With the botanical name Agave sisalana, Sisal is a flowering plant native to southern Mexico but widely cultivated and naturalized in many other countries. It yields a stiff fibre used in making rope and various other products. The term sisal may refer to the plant's common name or the fibre, depending on the context. It is sometimes referred to as "sisal hemp" because, for centuries, hemp was a major source of fiber, and other fiber sources were named after it. Global production of sisal fibre in 2013 amounted to 281 thousand tonnes of which Brazil, the largest producing This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed country, produced 150,584 tonnes. The sisal fibre is under CC BY-NC-ND traditionally used for rope and twine, and has many other uses, including paper, cloth, footwear, hats, bags, carpets, geotextiles, and dartboards. It is also used as fiber reinforcement for composite fiber-glass, rubber, and cement products. d. Phormium tenax / New Zealand flax This Photo by Unknown Author is This Photo by Unknown Author is This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND licensed under CC BY-SA licensed under CC BY-NC-ND Phormium tenax, commonly called New Zealand flax, is native to New Zealand. It is an evergreen, clump-forming tender perennial that is grown for its attractive foliage. It features rigid, sword-shaped, linear, bright green leaves (3-9' long) in erect clumps. Leaf margins and midribs are narrowly edged with red-orange. It is used in the manufacture of ropes, twine, bird snares, nets, cloaks, sandals, straps, skirts, and fine cloth, basket making, and numerous other items such as the poi-flax balls with uses in ceremonial dances and also as bolas in warfare. 2. SEED FIBRE a. Cotton Cotton (Gossypium spp.) is the world's most important textile fiber crop and a major oilseed crop. Of the fifty species of Gossypium, 45 are diploid, and five are tetraploid genomes, combining the ancestral A- and D-genome diploids. Four species, two A- genome species (G. herbaceum, G. arboretum), and two AD-genome species (G. hirsutum, G. barbadense), were independently domesticated and cultivated for their fibers. Among these four, G. hirsutum dominates world cotton commerce, representing over 90% of the annual cotton crop, while G. barbadense accounts for over 5% of world fiber production. Both G. hirsutum and G. barbadense are allotetraploid AD-genome cottons. Cotton breeders seek to improve yield and fiber quality, seed oil traits, and biotic and abiotic stress resistance to meet the demands of cotton producers and consumers. These traits are quantitative, and their expression is influenced by the environment at moderate to high levels. Advances in molecular genetics continue to result in dramatic achievements in the understanding and application of genomics tools.  UNIVESITY OF THE CORDILLERAS COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES - BS BIOLOGY 3. FRUIT FIBRE a. Coir fibre It is an inexpensive fruit fiber that is a byproduct of coconut extracted from its husk. 4. BAST FIBRE a. Jute Jute, Hindi pat, also called allyott, either of two species of Corchorus plants-C. capsularis, white jute, and C. olitorius, including both tossa and daisee varieties- belonging to the hibiscus, mallow, family (Malvaceae), and their fiber. The latter is a bast fibre; i.e., obtained from the inner bast tissue of the bark of the plant's stem. Jute fibre's primary use is in fabric packaging a wide range of agricultural and industrial commodities that require bags, sacks, packs, and wrappings. Wherever bulky, strong fabrics and twines resistant to stretching are required, jute is widely used because of its low cost. Burlap is made from jute. 5. STALK FIBRE a. Bamboo b. Maize c. Rice d. Barley B. ANIMAL FIBRE Animal fibers consist exclusively of proteins with the exception of silk. The basic elements of a protein molecule are carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, and oxygen. 1. Wool 2. Silk- Silk filaments are extruded by the larvae of moths and are used to spin their cocoons. C. MINERAL 1. ASBESTOS Asbestos is the name given to a group of naturally occurring fibrous minerals that are resistant to heat and corrosion. Because of these properties, asbestos has been used in commercial products such as insulation and fireproofing materials, automotive brakes, and wallboard materials This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-NC With the exception of mineral fibers, all-natural fibers have an affinity for water in both liquid and vapor forms. This strong affinity produces swelling of the fibres connected with the uptake of water, which facilitates dyeing in watery solutions. Unlike most synthetic fibers, all-natural fibers are non-thermoplastic; that is, they do not soften when heat is applied. At temperatures below the point at which they will decompose, they show little sensitivity to dry heat, and there is no shrinkage or high extensibility upon heating, nor do they become  UNIVESITY OF THE CORDILLERAS COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES - BS BIOLOGY brittle if cooled to below freezing. Natural fibres tend to yellow upon exposure to sunlight and moisture, and extended exposure results in loss of strength. II. MAN-MADE As the name itself indicates these textile fibres are made by man to meet the particular requirements. The chemical composition, structure, and properties are significantly modified during the manufacturing process. Depending on the raw material chosen for making these textile fibres - fibres can be further sub-classified into 3 categories: A. RE-GENERATED Regenerated synthetic textile fibers are also called semi-synthetic fibers. These fibers are naturally long-chain polymer structures, which are modified and partially degraded by a chemical process to enable the polymerization reaction to form the fibers. Most of the semi- synthetic fibres are called cellulose regenerated fibres. 1. Viscose rayon 2. Modal The cellulose required comes from various sources such as rayon from the tree wood, modal from the beech trees, seacell from seaweed. In the manufacturing process of these fibres, cellulose is fairly reduced to the pure viscose form and then foam and then foamed into the fibre form by extrusion through the spinnerets. B. SYNTHETIC Synthetic fibres are manufactured from the petrochemicals. These fibres are formed by the polymerization of monomers. Once the polymer is formed, it can be formed into a filament by converting it into fluid form and then extruding the molten or dissolved polymer through narrow holes to give filaments. The fiber from the molten polymer is formed by passing it through the spinneret. An alteration in structure, design, and, in other words - aspects of yarn can be done by altering the polymers used for it. These fibers are generally very strong, fine, and durable with very low moisture absorbency properties, so these fibers are also called hydrophobic fibers. 1. Nylon 2. Polyester 3. Acrylic 4. Polypropylene C. INORGANIC These textile fibers are also called metallic fibers. Metallic fibres are drawn from the ductile metals such as copper, gold, silver and can be extruded or deposited from more brittles such as nickel, aluminum and iron. From stainless steel also fibres can be formed. These fibres are not that much widely used but these fibres have their special applications in technical textile. 1. Tal fiber 2. Glass fiber III. TYPES OF FIBRES: 1. SOLUBLE Soluble fibre dissolves in the stomach, creating a sticky gel-like substance - a type of glue. This 'glue' traps certain components of food, fats and sugars, making them more difficult for the body to absorb.  UNIVESITY OF THE CORDILLERAS COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES - BS BIOLOGY This means that sugars (carbohydrates) are absorbed more slowly, and blood sugar levels are kept steadier for longer. Foods high in fibre and complex carbohydrates tend to have lower GI scores, sugars are released more slowly. When soluble fibre dissolves it can also bind to certain fats in our stomachs. People who have high-fibre diets are less likely to suffer from high cholesterol. Fibre can bind to and absorb cholesterol in the intestine before entering the bloodstream. This is especially the case for low-density lipoproteins (LDL), the 'bad' cholesterol, which, in high levels, can lead to serious health problems. People who want to lower their cholesterol are therefore advised to eat high-fiber foods and reduce their intake of saturated and trans fats. 2. INSOLUBLE Insoluble fiber does not dissolve in water or gastrointestinal fluids and remains more or less unchanged as it moves through the digestive tract. Insoluble fiber attracts water into your stool, making it softer and easier to pass with less strain on your bowel. Insoluble fiber can help promote bowel health and regularity. IV. IMPORTANCE: Fibre is a complex carbohydrate (type of sugar), but unlike other carbohydrates, which are broken down by the body to provide fuel in the form of glucose, fiber cannot be digested by the human body. Fibre or 'roughage' does, however, provide an important function in the body; it is essential to a well-tuned digestive system and can help the body remove potentially harmful waste. Nutritionists usually recommend that people increase their intake of high-fiber foods. BENEFITS: High fibre foods help to fill you up. Fibre is bulky and takes up space in our stomachs, making us feel full and leaving less room for other foods containing calories. This can be helpful if you are trying to reduce your calorie intake and lose or maintain weight. Foods that are high in fibre keep you feeling fuller for longer. It takes the body longer to process fibre and move it through the digestive system. This means your stomach stays fuller for longer after eating high-fibre foods. Fibre is well known for sustaining regular bowel movements and helping to prevent constipation as it stimulates the digestive system. Fibre is useful for maintaining healthy colon function, and high fiber diets may help prevent colon and other types of cancer. People who eat a lot of fibre are more likely to be slimmer and less likely to put weight on than those who eat less fibre. V. FIBER EXTRACTION Fibre is extracted by a process known as decortication, where leaves are crushed, beaten, and brushed away by a rotating wheel set with blunt knives, so that only fibres remain. Alternatively, in East Africa, where production is typically on large estates, the leaves are transported to a central decortication plant, where water is used to wash away the waste parts of the leaf. The fibre is then  UNIVESITY OF THE CORDILLERAS COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES - BS BIOLOGY dried, brushed and baled for export. Proper drying is important as fibre quality depends largely on moisture content. Artificial drying has been found to result in generally better grades of fiber than sun drying but is not always feasible in the less industrialized countries where sisal is produced. In the drier climate of north-east Brazil, sisal is mainly grown by smallholders and the fibre is extracted by teams using portable raspadors which do not use water. Fibre is subsequently cleaned by brushing. Dry fibres are machine combed and sorted into various grades, largely on the basis of the previous in-field separation of leaves into size groups.