Effect of enzymatic treatments on mechanical, structural, and thermal properties of alfa fibers

Abstract

Previously, we developed a series of processes that involved chemical and enzymatic treatments to extract and separate the fibers from alfa leaves, while also preserving their native mechanical properties, by optimizing the implementation parameters. In this study, we describe the morphology of the alfa leaf, characterize the alfa fibers, and study the influence of different treatments on their crystalline structure, their colorimetric, and thermal properties. This work mentions the application of Weibull statistics to analyze the mechanical properties of alfa fibers, which helps in understanding the probability of failure under different stress conditions. Additionally, we also examined the difference in mechanical properties between a fiber bundle and a single fiber. The results show that the cellulose has not been attacked after different treatments, and the thermal stability of the fibers has improved. X-ray analysis shows that the crystallinity index of the fibers increased by about 16.4% for the alkaline and pectinase treatments. Also, we noticed that the enzymatic treatments led to reduction in the dispersion of mechanical properties. Moreover, we observed that the bundle with a smaller diameter is stronger than the one with a larger diameter. Under tensile loading, it behaves similarly to a unitary fiber, demonstrating a single break.Keywords: Enzymatic treatments, Alkaline treatment, Thermal stability, Weibull approach, Mechanical properties, Single fiber.