Another application for wood fibres that has recently gained interest is wood polymer composite materials. The properties of these materials do not only depend on the structure of the fibre network, but also on the interaction between the fibres and the polymer matrix surrounding the fibres. Advances in imaging technology have made it possible to acquire 3D images of paper and wood polymer composite materials. In this project, image analysis methods for characterizing the 3D material structure in such images are developed. The detailed knowledge of the material structure attainable with these methods is useful for improving material properties and for developing new materials.
The project objective is to achieve a complete segmentation of individual fibres and pores in volume images of the material. Given such a segmentation, any desired measurement of the internal structure is available. Measurements on individual fibres and the structural arrangement of fibres can then be related to macroscopic material properties.
In this project, different volume images of paper and composite materials are available: one volume created from a series of 2D scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images at StoraEnso, Falun; and X-ray microtomography volume images of paper and composite samples imaged at the European Radiation Synchrotron Facility (ESRF) in Grenoble, France, at the Paul Scherrer Institut (PSI) in Villigen, Switzerland and also from tabletop scanners at University of Jyväskylä, Finland and Innventia, Stockholm.
Two papers were submitted during 2011, one on measuring the fibre length distribution in composites from micro-CT images, and one on swelling of fibres in a composite due to moisture uptake. An overview article on characterization of nanofibrillated wood fibres appeared in the book Nanocomposites and Polymers with Analytical Methods.
Within the project, methods have been developed to generate and pack synthetic wood fibres as well as to simulate µCT acquisition systems with characteristic artifacts.
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