Fiber banana plant

Hemp is made from the bast fibers of Cannabis sativa. This is a larger plant than flax, and produces much coarser fibers. Abaca or Manila hemp is very different from plain hemp. Abaca is made from Musa textilis, commonly called the fiber banana plant. The core fibers of the leaf sheaths of this plant are resistant to salt water, which makes them useful for rope and fabric to be used at sea. It is also used to make handicrafts such as hats and household items. Paper made from abaca has a wide variety of uses, including paper currency (i.e. Japanese yen notes), sausage casings, industrial filters, and tea bags. The finest grade abaca is woven into a cloth called pinukpok. 

Manila Musa textilis) is related to the banana plant and grows mainly in the East Indies. Sisal is obtained in India and Mexico from a kind of agave. Both are leaf fibers and not stalk fibers as in the case of hemp and flax. 

Abaca. The abaca fiber is obtained from the leaves of the banana-like plant (same genus) Musa textilis (banana family, Musaceae). The fiber is also called Manila hemp from the port of its first shipment, although it has no relationship with hemp, a bast fiber. The mature plant has 12—20 stalks growing from its rhizome root system the stalks are 2.6—6.7 m tall and 10—20 cm thick at the base. The stalk has leaf sheaths that expand iato leaves 1—2.5 m long, 10—20 cm wide, and 10 mm thick at the center the fibers are ia the outermost layer. The plant produces a crop after five years, and 2—4 stalks can be harvested about every six months. 

Such an approach to fiber classification appears to be systematic and objective. Unfortunately, plants do not always follow the pattern of roots, trunk, leaves, seed, or fruit. There are anomalies. For example, the banana-like plants, yielding abaca, do not have the woody trunk conventionally associated with other plants. Instead, its stem consists of layers of thick, crescentshaped (in cross section) sheaths wrapped around each other they reduce to spindly growths that unfurl from the stem and become the thick central stems of fronds (see Section 8.2.1). Botanically, the sheath-frond system is called a leaf consequently, the fiber extracted from the sheath is classified as leaf fiber. On the other hand, sisal or henequen fibers come from the swordlike leaves of their respective plants. Bagasse (from sugarcane) fiber, used for paper or fiberboard, comes from the stem, which is neither a leaf nor a woody trunk. Thus, the classification of fibers as seed, bast, leaf, or miscellaneous fibers is somewhat arbitrary. 

A pilot-plant, double-drum dryer modified to produce low-moisture flakes from a wide range of fruit purees has been described [46]. Products with a relatively high fiber content such as apples, guavas, apricots, bananas, papayas, and cranberries could be dried successfully without additives. Purees with a low fiber content such as raspberries, strawberries, and blueberries required the addition of fiber (low methoxyl pectin, up to 1%) to aid in the sheet formation at the doctor blade. The modification consisted of incorporation of variable-speed take-off rolls, cool airflow directed at the doctor blade area, and a ventilation system to remove saturated air from the area beneath the drums. 

Fibers collected from seeds or seed cases, e.g. cotton and kapok Fibers collected from leaves, e.g. fique, sisal, banana and agave Fibers are collected from the skin or bast surrounding the stem of their respective plant. These fibers have higher tensile strength than other fibers. Therefore, these fibers are used for durable yam, fabric, packaging, and paper. Some examples are flax, jute, kenaf, industrial hemp, ramie, rattan, and vine fibers. 

The bast and leaf fibers give mechanical support to the plant s stem and leaf, respectively. Bast consists of a wood core surrounded by stem, and within the stem, there are a numbers of fiber bundles, each containing individual fiber cells or filaments. The bast fibers such as, hemp, flax, jute, kenaf, and ramie are usually grown in warm climates. The leaf fibers, such as sisal, abaca, banana, and henequen, are coarser than bast fibers. The seed-hair fibers, such as cotton, coir, and milkweed, are attached to the plant s seeds [68]. 

There are several different classifications in terms of plant fibers. While the classification of Nishino [59] includes seven groups as bast (soft) fibers (flax, hemp, jute), leaf (hard) fibers (sisal, abaca, pineapple, etc.), stem fibers (bamboo, banana stalk, corn stalk), fruit fibers (coconut), seed fibers (cotton, baobab, kapok), straw fibers (rice, wheat, corn), and others (seaweeds, palm), that of Faruk et al. [3] has six groups bast fibers (jute, flax, hemp), leaf fibers (abaca, sisal and pineapple), seed fibers (coir, cotton and kapok), core fibers (kenaf, hemp and jute), grass and reed fibers (wheat, corn and rice) and all other types (wood and roots). 

Natural fibers vary widely in chemical composition, stmcture, and dimension and are obtained from different parts of the plants. Natural fibers, such as jute, ramie, flax, kenaf, and hemp are obtained from the stem abaca, sisal, banana and pineapple from the leaf cotton, coir, and kapok from the seed grass, and reed fibers (com, rice, and wheat) [4]. Climatic conditions, age, and fiber extraction... 

Biofibers are classified according to the part of the plant they are extracted from. Some fibers, like cotton, are part of the seeds of plants. Some fibers, like hemp and flax, are contained within the tissues of the stems of plants and referred to as bast fibers. Some fibers, like sisal and banana, are part of the leaves of plants. Some fibers, like coconut, are part of the fruit of plants. Biofibers most commonly used as reinforcements in composites are shown in Table 10.2. 

CNWs were initially isolated from natural fibers by Mukherjee and Woods [12] in 1953. They can be prepared from a variety of sources such as wood pulp, plant fibers (e.g., hemp, sisal, flax, ramie, jute, algae, cotton) [13, 14], tree leaves [15], microbial (acetobacter xylinum) [16], sea creatures (tunicates) [17, 18], fiuit skins (banana and grape) [19], fruit husks (coconuts) [20], and even agricultoral products (e.g., wheat straws and soy huUs) [21], which makes them more attractive and applicable. Three methods are available for producing nanocellulose, namely, chemical acid hydrolysis, chemical treatment in combination with mechanical refining and the enzymatic methods. 

The most common fibers in biocomposites come from linen, hemp, cotton, jute, coconut, banana, and leaves of various kinds of agave. The basic problem with the proper application of natural fibers is their great variation in quality and mechanical properties. Synthetic fibers such as glass fiber and carbon fiber have very specific physical characteristics, but the features of natural fiber depend on many factors, such as their origin, the age of the plant, whether the material comes from leaves or stem, and on the process of obtaining the fiber and its preparation. 

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