Technologies
Calcium carbonate enables sustainability in polymer fiber applications
Calcium carbonate, which is ubiquitous in nature, can be found everywhere in daily life. It is used widely as a coating agent for paper or cardboards and for paints; as an additive in food pharma and cosmetics; as a soil fertilizer in agriculture; for water remineralization; for flue gas desulfurization; and many other applications. In …
Student Spotlight: Multifunctional temperature-responsive textiles
The Soft Functional Materials Lab @ VCU is motivated to apply fundamental science to solving challenging and practical problems. The lab focuses on the processing and characterization of soft functional materials with applications in biomedical and environmental engineering. Lab members work at the interface of polymer science, nanotechnology and biotechnology, to design, process, and apply …
Student Spotlight: Reusable textiles for liquid and virus repellency
Anthony John Galante is pursuing a Ph.D. in Industrial Engineering at the University of Pittsburgh, where he is conducting research on microbe repellent surfaces at the Lab for Advanced Materials in Pittsburgh (LAMP). His research focuses on the application of surfaces with different functionalities such as self-cleaning, stain-resistance, bacteria-repellency and virus repellency. Galante’s interest in …
Enhancements in low-temperature dyeable polyester filament yarn
Polyester fibers and yarns dominate the global synthetic fiber industry and are forecast to increase their market share in the future. This is due to polyester’s unique, inherent properties such as excellent dimensional stability, high price/performance ratio, easy and quick fabric processing, adaptability for most technical applications, fashion-oriented product variety, durability, enhanced colorfastness, and easy …
Bicomponent fiber – get more than 2x
A biocomponent fiber, or bico, is a fiber that combines two separate polymers into a single filament. The term conjugate fiber is also used as a synonym. The process of making a bicomponent fiber is relatively straightforward. There are a number of patents that describe this practice. Commonly, the fiber is constructed of two …