Wool Research Organisation of New Zealand (WRONZ) chairman Derrick Millton said in the company’s 2016-17 annual report it is still working with traditional manufacturing industries to develop new technical textiles.
“The majority of the research investment seeks new ways to utilise wool as a source of high-value keratin, for example, for use in cosmetics and high-value textile fibres.”
A year into the latest project and Millton said researchers are still on the discovery phase to determine the properties and functionality of deconstructed fibres and reconstituted materials.
The research is handled by Wool Industry Research and in the year under review it received $1.2 million from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, $1.8m from WRONZ and $100,000 from the industry.
Of that, $600,000 went into industry-good research and $2.4m into finding new uses.
WRONZ has assets of $41m, of which $39m is in a managed investment portfolio generating research income of $2m in the year under review, up from $1.8m a year earlier.
Other research centres on developing environmental credentials, working with apparel, textile and outdoor industries and developing a country of origin test for wool fibre.
Millton said new uses being explored include using crossbred wool fibres to replace glass as the reinforcement in circuit boards, relevant where weight is an issue.
Initial work shows the fibres perform dielectrically better than glass at some frequencies, recording energy loss comparable to silica.
“These two factors are key criteria in preventing the loss of data and improving the speed of data transfer for circuit board materials,” he said.
Researchers from WRONZ, AgResearch, Canterbury University and Lincoln Agritech are working on the project, potentially tapping into a $71 billion industry.
Other uses for wool being investigated include a new generation of filters and studies into the structure and chemical make-up of the fibre to identify new research approaches.
Millton said the largest project is being done by Lincoln Agritech. It involves finding novel methods of breaking down wool fibre into component materials then reconstituting them into useful new materials.
