Nanotechnology in Textiles

Theory and Application

Rajesh Mishra,Jiri Militky

• Publisher: Woodhead Publishing
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9780081026274
• Topic: Tecnologia e ingegneria
• Subtopic: Ingegneria chimica e biochimica

Nanotechnology in Textiles: Theory and Application explains how conventional methods for treating fabrics for specific functions can by improved upon with the use of nanotechnology. Overviews of relevant, fundamental nanophysics and nanochemistry theory are provided, along with explanations of their application in textile finishing, providing a crucial resource for readers exploring this expanding frontier in textiles. The book draws on research from around the globe to address the latest nanotechnological developments that are all examined with references to industrial applications.

• Provides a complete, theoretical overview of nanotechnology and nanofibers for those with materials science or engineering backgrounds
• Covers a broad range of topics, including aerogels, polymer nanocomposites, nanohazards, and electrospinning
• Looks ahead to emerging applications of nanotechnology in textiles to point the way for further research and innovation

1

Nature, nanoscience, and textile structures

Rajesh Mishra; Jiri Militky Department of Material Engineering, Faculty of Textile Engineering, Technical University of Liberec, Liberec, Czech Republic

Abstract

In the past decades, research into nanoscience and nanotechnologies has grown explosively and stimulated a large panel of scientific and technological fields. The boosting effect comes either from the reinvestigation of scientific fields by considering the nanoscale as a relevant level for improving our knowledge or from the extraordinary development of new tools that have democratized access to the nanoscale, such as AFM, which is now a routine tool in most labs. Nanoscience and nanotechnology (NST) are widely considered as one of the most promising areas of scientific and technological development for future decades. As a consequence, almost every country in the world has chosen to invest significantly in this area. This choice, however, is only a first step in the investment decision process, given that almost any scientific discipline can be taken at the scale of a nanometer. In this chapter, it is argued that foresight studies to decide where to invest in the nanotechnology area should be designed in a different way from what is normally done. Nanotechnology, in fact, has specific characteristics that should be taken into account when evaluating its expected impacts and potentialities.

Keywords

Nanoscience; Nanotechnology; Scanning tunneling microscope; Atomic force microscope; Chitosan; Biomimetics

1.1 Introduction

Nanoscience and nanotechnology refer to the study, manipulation, engineering, and application of matter, particles, and structures on the nanometer (nm) scale (1 nm = 10^{− 9} m). The “nano” in nanotechnology comes from the Greek word “nanos” that means dwarf. One nanometer is one-billionth of a meter, that is, 10^{− 9} m. The fundamentals of nanotechnology lie in the fact that properties of substances dramatically change when their size is reduced to the nanometer range. Often, nanomaterials are defined by a size range limited by at least one of the dimensions. This range may be 1–100 nm (British Standards Institution 2007; ISO 2008), 0.1–100 nm, less than 100 nm, or less than 500 nm. The most common and accepted definition is probably the 1–100 nm range. In addition, it is sometimes suggested that to be counted as a nanomaterial, the material must have properties different from those of the bulk form of the same chemical substance. The nanorange is not characterizing the properties of matter. Usually, the low level of nano (approximately 1–10 nm) has very different behavior from moderate level of nano (approximately 10–30 nm) and far nanorange (over 30 nm). This is valid, for example, for influence of grain size on the yield strength of grained metals. This dependence for coarse-grained metals follows the Hall-Petch relationship where the yield strength is proportional to reciprocal value of grain size. Strength is therefore increasing with decreasing of grain size. Maximum yield strength is for grain size about 25 nm. For smaller grain sizes, yield strength is decreasing very seriously and at 20 nm reaches approximately the same value as for 30 nm.

The European Commission released their suggested definition of nanomaterials: “‘nanomaterial’ means a natural, incidental, or manufactured material containing particles, in an unbound state or as an aggregate or as an agglomerate and where, for 50 % or more of the particles in the number size distribution, one or more external dimensions is in the size range 1–100 nm” (European Commission: Commission recommendation of 18 October 2011 on the definition of nanomaterial. Brussels 2011). This definition is used in EU standard nanotechnologies—terminology and definitions for nanoobjects—nanoparticle, nanofiber, and nanoplate: ISO/TS 80004–2:2015(en). The big future of nano was launched by R. Feynman at an American Physical Society meeting at Caltech on 29 December 1959 in lecture “There’s plenty of room at the bottom.”

Important properties of materials, such as the magnetic, electric, optical, thermal, and mechanical properties, are determined by the way molecules and atoms assemble at the nanoscale. Nanoscience and nanotechnology are at the forefront of modern research, and they are considered the new revolution for the 21st century. Nanoscience education is still emerging, and unlike other areas of science education, there are some gaps to fill and explore the crucial ideas of nanoscience and nanotechnology. The continuous advance of nanomaterials science and its unprecedented application in more and more nanotechnology-based consumer products indicate that nanomaterials are crucial to develop new applications: biological tagging, medical diagnostics and treatment, solar energy harvesting, catalysis, and electro-optical applications. Given the expected economic and social impact of nanotechnology products and the fact that many areas of application are still scarcely explored, it can foresee that industrial use of nanomaterials will continue to increase in the future. However, one of the “grand challenges” for nanotechnology is bottleneck for the development and implementation of the field. It is even the same situation where we may have the research results for new nanoapplications but without having skilled workers to translate them out of research centers. Nanoscience and nanotechnology scientific disciplines are situated at the interface between physics, chemistry, biochemistry, biotechnology, materials science, medicine, microelectronics, and computer science. Control of these disciplines therefore requires an academic and multidisciplinary scientific education. Then, it seems reasonable that a multidisciplinary scientific research is crucial to provide industry and research institutes with top quality experts. However, the physical infrastructure in nanoscale science is still in formation, being the multidisciplinary understanding one of the bottlenecks [1, 2]. In general, the researchers have difficulties to understand the underlying scientific principles that lead the unique properties at the nanoscale. And what are more important, researchers also have difficulties in implementing high-quality nanoscale material to produce a deep understanding of nanoscience concepts. Considering the previous facts, there is a need of both thinking minutely with efficiently scientific tools to assist in the knowledge transfer. Online resources are considered to be useful in areas of science where records of complex laboratory demonstrations or physical/chemical phenomena might be more effectively communicated than would prose. For instance, the use of images and documentaries and the ability to share them through the Internet have revolutionized scientific procedures, enhanced our ability to discover new things, and offered new opportunities for research. It is a valuable tool because it can be used to show researchers things that would be otherwise hard to transfer in a limited period of time. In fact, an increasing number of scientists use the Internet to present their results at scientific meetings, during lectures, or in their publications as online supplementary material. Then, it seems clear that the use of Internet to understand the concepts and phenomena occurring at a world where the scale is far beyond our dimensions could ease research in nanoscience. In nanoscience, the past advances and the future prospects in new topics ranging from properties of nanomaterials to their societal impacts are studied in much detail [3–6].

Nanoscience and nanotechnology (NST) are widely considered as one of the most promising areas of scientific and technological development for future decades. As a consequence, almost every country in the world has chosen to invest significantly in this area. This choice, however, is only a first step in the investment decision process, given that almost any scientific discipline can be taken at the scale of a nanometer. In this chapter, it is argued that foresight studies to decide where to invest in the nanotechnology area should be designed in a different way from what is normally done. Nanotechnology, in fact, has specific characteristics that should be taken into account when evaluating its expected impacts and potentialities.

Some nanomaterials (as nanofibrous assemblies) have some limitations for practical use because they are too weak and too sensitive to abrasion to be outer or inner part of structures in conditions of using and maintenance, they have some effect on nanolevel only, and they have serious limits for longer time durability in common conditions. Their effects are often only temporarily. Till now, there is unprecise information oriented to hi...