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04 Nov 2022

Materials

Research reveals thermal conductivity of cellulose fibres

Researchers have developed a new material made from nanoscale cellulose fibres that shows high thermal conductivity, an advance that makes it useful as a replacement for synthetic polymer materials.

Artist’s impression of the way natural cellulose fibres are combined to form the CNF yarn, and a magnified section showing the nanoscopic rod-shaped filaments within the yarn bundle - ©2022 Junichiro Shiomi

Cellulose is a key structural component of plant cell walls, and its material strength is derived from overlapping nanoscopic fibres. In recent years, many commercial products have used cellulose nanofibre (CNF) materials because their strength and durability make them a good replacement for polymer-based materials such as plastics.

Now, and for the first time, a research team led by Professor Junichiro Shiomi from the University of Tokyo’s Graduate School of Engineering has investigated previously unknown thermal properties of CNF.

“If you see plant-derived materials such as cellulose or woody biomass used in applications, it’s typically mechanical or thermally insulating properties that are being employed,” Shiomi said in a statement. “When we explored the thermal properties of a yarn made from CNF, however, we found that they show a different kind of thermal behaviour, thermal conduction, and it’s very significant, around 100 times higher than that of typical woody biomass or cellulose paper.”

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