Definitions
Fibrous
the building blocks
Fibrous structure
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an object containing, consisting of or resembling fibres.
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Fibre
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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).
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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.
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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).
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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. ​
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Textile fibres are a specific length referred to as ‘short’ or ‘staple’ fibres. Most naturally occurring fibres used in textiles fall within this classification.
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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.

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