Journal of Textile Science & Engineering

Lignocellulosic fibers are plant-based bio-fibers that are sourced from terrestrial and non-terrestrial plants that also include agricultural by-products. In textile industry, being a renewable and sustainable resource, these fibers have attained market potential with their special qualities including biodegradability, applicability in green chemistry,
ecofriendly properties and cost effectiveness in processing. Lignocellulosic fibers mainly comprise plant cell walls that are essentially composed of cellulose, lignin, pectin, hemicelluloses and waxes. Numerous studies have been conducted to explain the commercial performance, mechanical properties and sustainability of these lignocellulosic fibers. Although several work have been conducted on the cell wall compositional aspects of these fibers, majority of the studies have been focused on understanding the cellulose and lignin constituents. Hence, there is an increasing need for more studies to be conducted on non-cellulosic cell wall components in these fibers. In this study, we performed a novel immunological approach namely glycome profiling on two commercially important lignocellulosic fibers from aquatic and terrestrial plants namely duckweed and hemp, respectively. Our studies demonstrated differences in the extractability of cell wall glycans from biomass materials from these plants. Duckweed biomass had significantly higher abundance of extractable pectins in their walls. However, cell walls from biomass raw materials of terrestrial plant, hemp had lesser amounts of pectin with significantly higher amounts of xylans that are easily extractable. Duckweed fibers had significantly higher proportion of lignin-associated cell wall glycans in comparison to that of hemp. These results demonstrate that lignocellulosic fiber raw materials from varied plant sources are different in non-cellulosic cell wall glycan compositions and comprehending these variations could potentially be instrumental in commercial processing of these fibers.

Nowadays, consumers increasingly demand more environmentally friendly products. This also affects the textile industry, and thus, aspects such as control of water, energy and chemicals consumption should be taken into account in textile processes. Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) is the most widely used bleaching agent for textiles and came into use around. Hydrogen peroxide is suitable for most fibers and it can be used in a wide range of machines under different conditions. Reaction products are non-toxic and non-dangerous it is applicable in strongly alkaline medium and it requires a high temperature to give the most effective bleaching. Recent research in our laboratories has focused on the development and application of compounds that enhance the bleaching process. In this investigation in order to optimize time and temperature of bleaching process various experimentations were carried out, this study reveals that, a) an increase the temperature the rate of bleaching is increases & correspondingly reduction in process time. b) An increase in concentration of (H2O2) whiteness and weight loss is increases c) Hardness of water inversely proportional to whiteness & directly proportional to weight loss. d) The concentration of peroxide stabilizer is inversely proportional to the whiteness and directly proportional to weight loss.

Increasing global competition in textiles has created many challenges in finishing criteria. The impact of UV rays on human skin leads to skin cancer, skin inflammation and sunburn. An innovative approach was made to introducing new novel eco-friendly herbal oil treated UV protective finish on Bamboo 100%, Tencel 100% and Bamboo/Tencel 50:50 fabrics. The three herbal oils were selected and treated on all the three fabrics. The fabrics are taken for UV test using a spectrophotometer. The untreated and treated fabrics are then evaluated. The result showed that Grape fruit oil enhance the UV protective property when compared to other oils in Bamboo & Tencel fabrics.