10/24/2018 Fiber - Wikipedia

Fiber
Fiber or fibre (see spelling differences, from the Latin fibra[1]) is a natural or
synthetic substance that is significantly longer than it is wide.[2] Fibers are
often used in the manufacture of other materials. The strongest engineering
materials often incorporate fibers, for example carbon fiber and ultra-high-
molecular-weight polyethylene.

Synthetic fibers can often be produced very cheaply and in large amounts
compared to natural fibers, but for clothing natural fibers can give some
benefits, such as comfort, over their synthetic counterparts.

Contents
Natural fibers
Human-made fibers
Semi-synthetic fibers
Synthetic fibers
See also A bundle of optical fibers
References

Natural fibers
Natural fibers develop or occur in the fiber shape, and include those produced by plants, animals, and geological
processes.[2] They can be classified according to their origin:

Vegetable fibers are generally based on arrangements of cellulose, often with lignin: examples include cotton, hemp,
jute, flax, ramie, sisal, bagasse, and banana. Plant fibers are employed in the manufacture of paper and textile (cloth),
and dietary fiber is an important component of human nutrition.
Wood fiber, distinguished from vegetable fiber, is from tree sources. Forms include groundwood, lacebark,
thermomechanical pulp (TMP), and bleached or unbleached kraft or sulfite pulps. Kraft and sulfite (also called
sulphite) refer to the type of pulping process used to remove the lignin bonding the original wood structure, thus
freeing the fibers for use in paper and engineered wood products such as fiberboard.
Animal fibers consist largely of particular proteins. Instances are silkworm silk, spider silk, sinew, catgut, wool, sea silk
and hair such as cashmere wool, mohair and angora, fur such as sheepskin, rabbit, mink, fox, beaver, etc.
Mineral fibers include the asbestos group. Asbestos is the only naturally occurring long mineral fiber. Six minerals
have been classified as "asbestos" including chrysotile of the serpentine class and those belonging to the amphibole
class: amosite, crocidolite, tremolite, anthophyllite and actinolite. Short, fiber-like minerals include wollastonite and
palygorskite.
Biological fibers also known as fibrous proteins or protein filaments consist largely of biologically relevant and
biologically very important proteins, mutations or other genetic defects can lead to severe diseases. Instances are
collagen[3] family of proteins, tendon, muscle proteins like actin, cell proteins like microtubules and many others,
spider silk, sinew and hair etc.

Human-made fibers
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Human-made or chemical fibers are fibers whose chemical composition, structure, and properties are significantly
modified during the manufacturing process.[4] Man-made fibers consist of regenerated fibers and synthetic fibers.

Semi-synthetic fibers
Semi-synthetic fibers are made from raw materials with naturally long-chain polymer structure and are only modified and
partially degraded by chemical processes, in contrast to completely synthetic fibers such as nylon (polyamide) or dacron
(polyester), which the chemist synthesizes from low-molecular weight compounds by polymerization (chain-building)
reactions. The earliest semi-synthetic fiber is the cellulose regenerated fiber, rayon.[5] Most semi-synthetic fibers are
cellulose regenerated fibers.

Cellulose regenerated fibers

Cellulose fibers are a subset of man-made fibers, regenerated from natural cellulose. The cellulose comes from various
sources: rayon from tree wood fiber, Modal from beech trees, bamboo fiber from bamboo, seacell from seaweed, etc. In the
production of these fibers, the cellulose is reduced to a fairly pure form as a viscous mass and formed into fibers by
extrusion through spinnerets. Therefore, the manufacturing process leaves few characteristics distinctive of the natural
source material in the finished products.

Some examples of this fiber type are:

rayon
bamboo fiber
Lyocell, a brand of rayon
Modal, using beech trees as input
diacetate fiber
triacetate fiber.
Historically, cellulose diacetate and -triacetate were classified under the term rayon, but are now considered distinct
materials.

Synthetic fibers
Synthetic come entirely from synthetic materials such as petrochemicals, unlike those man-made fibers derived from such
natural substances as cellulose or protein.[6]

Fiber classification in reinforced plastics falls into two classes: (i) short fibers, also known as discontinuous fibers, with a
general aspect ratio (defined as the ratio of fiber length to diameter) between 20 and 60, and (ii) long fibers, also known as
continuous fibers, the general aspect ratio is between 200 and 500.[7]

Metallic fibers
Metallic fibers can be drawn from ductile metals such as copper, gold or silver and extruded or deposited from more brittle
ones, such as nickel, aluminum or iron. See also Stainless steel fibers.

Carbon fiber
Carbon fibers are often based on oxidized and via pyrolysis carbonized polymers like PAN, but the end product is almost
pure carbon.

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Silicon carbide fiber

Silicon carbide fibers, where the basic polymers are not hydrocarbons but polymers, where about 50% of the carbon atoms
are replaced by silicon atoms, so-called poly-carbo-silanes. The pyrolysis yields an amorphous silicon carbide, including
mostly other elements like oxygen, titanium, or aluminium, but with mechanical properties very similar to those of carbon
fibers.

Fiberglass
Fiberglass, made from specific glass, and optical fiber, made from purified natural quartz, are also man-made fibers that
come from natural raw materials, silica fiber, made from sodium silicate (water glass) and basalt fiber made from melted
basalt.

Mineral fibers
Mineral fibers can be particularly strong because they are formed with a low number of surface defects, asbestos is a
common one.[8]

Polymer fibers

Polymer fibers are a subset of man-made fibers, which are based on synthetic chemicals (often from petrochemical
sources) rather than arising from natural materials by a purely physical process. These fibers are made from:

polyamide nylon
PET or PBT polyester
phenol-formaldehyde (PF)
polyvinyl chloride fiber (PVC) vinyon
polyolefins (PP and PE) olefin fiber
acrylic polyesters, pure polyester PAN fibers are used to make carbon fiber by roasting them in a low oxygen
environment. Traditional acrylic fiber is used more often as a synthetic replacement for wool. Carbon fibers and
PF fibers are noted as two resin-based fibers that are not thermoplastic, most others can be melted.
aromatic polyamids (aramids) such as Twaron, Kevlar and Nomex thermally degrade at high temperatures and do
not melt. These fibers have strong bonding between polymer chains
polyethylene (PE), eventually with extremely long chains / HMPE (e.g. Dyneema or Spectra).
Elastomers can even be used, e.g. spandex although urethane fibers are starting to replace spandex technology.
polyurethane fiber
Elastolefin
Coextruded fibers have two distinct polymers forming the fiber, usually as a core-sheath or side-by-side. Coated fibers
exist such as nickel-coated to provide static elimination, silver-coated to provide anti-bacterial properties and
aluminum-coated to provide RF deflection for radar chaff. Radar chaff is actually a spool of continuous glass tow that
has been aluminum coated. An aircraft-mounted high speed cutter chops it up as it spews from a moving aircraft to
confuse radar signals.

Microfibers
Microfibers in textiles refer to sub-denier fiber (such as polyester drawn to 0.5 denier). Denier and Dtex are two
measurements of fiber yield based on weight and length. If the fiber density is known, you also have a fiber diameter,
otherwise it is simpler to measure diameters in micrometers. Microfibers in technical fibers refer to ultra fine fibers (glass
or meltblown thermoplastics) often used in filtration. Newer fiber designs include extruding fiber that splits into multiple
finer fibers. Most synthetic fibers are round in cross-section, but special designs can be hollow, oval, star-shaped or

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trilobal. The latter design provides more optically reflective properties. Synthetic textile fibers are often crimped to
provide bulk in a woven, non woven or knitted structure. Fiber surfaces can also be dull or bright. Dull surfaces reflect
more light while bright tends to transmit light and make the fiber more transparent.

Very short and/or irregular fibers have been called fibrils. Natural cellulose, such as cotton or bleached kraft, show smaller
fibrils jutting out and away from the main fiber structure.[9]

See also
Ceramic matrix composite
Dietary fiber
Fiber crop
Fibers in Differential Geometry
Molded fiber
Nerve fiber
Optical fiber

References
1. Harper, Douglas. "fiber" (http://www.etymonline.com/?term=fiber). Online Etymology Dictionary.
2. Kadolph, Sara (2002). Textiles. Prentice Hall. ISBN 0-13-025443-6.
3. Saad, Mohamed (Oct 1994). Low resolution structure and packing investigations of collagen crystalline domains in
tendon using Synchrotron Radiation X-rays, Structure factors determination, evaluation of Isomorphous Replacement
methods and other modeling (https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B3L_EN9hIuFTTkhuN2lrWEU4RDQ&authuser=0).
PhD Thesis, Université Joseph Fourier Grenoble I. pp. 1–221. doi:10.13140/2.1.4776.7844 (https://doi.org/10.13140%
2F2.1.4776.7844).
4. "man-made fibre" (http://global.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/361113/man-made-fibre). Encyclopædia Britannica.
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. 2013.
5. Kauffman, George B. (1993). "Rayon: the first semi-synthetic fiber product". Journal of Chemical Education. 70 (11):
887. Bibcode:1993JChEd..70..887K (http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1993JChEd..70..887K). doi:10.1021/ed070p887
(https://doi.org/10.1021%2Fed070p887).
6. "synthetic fibre" (http://global.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/578682/synthetic-fibre). Encyclopædia Britannica.
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. 2013.
7. Serope Kalpakjian, Steven R Schmid. "Manufacturing Engineering and Technology". International edition. 4th Ed.
Prentice Hall, Inc. 2001. ISBN 0-13-017440-8.
8. James Edward Gordon; Philip Ball (2006). The new science of strong materials, or, Why you don't fall through the
floor (https://books.google.com/books?id=jyCFQgAACAAJ). Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-12548-0.
Retrieved 28 October 2011.
9. Hans-J. Koslowski. "Man-Made Fibers Dictionary". Second edition. Deutscher Fachverlag. 2009 ISBN 3-86641-163-4

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