Definitions
Fibrous
the building blocks
Fibrous structure
an object containing, consisting of or resembling fibres.
Fibre
Textile Designers
A textile raw material, generally characterised by flexibility, fineness and high length-to- thickness ratio (meaning that the length of the fibre is many magnitudes of order greater than the width).
Material Scientists
The definition for a material scientist would include, in addition to the above, the characteristic high tensile strength (strong when two ends are pulled in opposite directions) and lack of any compressive resistance.
Biology
a fibre as a term applied to describe a thin elongated cell, this includes naturally occurring fibres such as cotton but excludes wool (a fibre made of multiple cells) and silk (a protein material extruded by various insects).
According to biologists’ cotton is a fibre but wool and silk are fibrous. Skins/ leathers are also considered fibrous although it is not possible to distinguish individual fibres from these materials.
Textile fibres are a specific length referred to as ‘short’ or ‘staple’ fibres. Most naturally occurring fibres used in textiles fall within this classification.
Fibres of continuous or undefined long length are called filaments. All man-made fibres are produced in this form while the only naturally occurring filament fibre is silk.
.jpg)
