Linen fabric from ancient Egypt has retained for more than four thousand years remarkable mechanical properties that allow the use of this fabric in modern composite materials, AFP reported, citing a publication in the specialized edition “Nature Plants”.
The beige burial canvas, dated between 2140 and 1976 BC, has been in the Louvre’s collection since 1929.
A team of scientists from the Dupuis de Lomé Research Institute at the University of Southern Brittany, France, subjected the fabric to a series of tests to compare its stability and preservation of its structure.
They were “surprised to find similar properties of the fabric after a thousand years of aging and almost no change in its mechanical properties,” said study leader Alain Burmo of the institute.
“By studying the aging process of old fabrics, we want to learn how to develop more effective modern fabrics,” he explained.
Flax fibers are found in many composite materials in the automotive, aerospace and shipping industries. “Each of us probably has flax fibers mixed with polymers in our car,” Burmo said.
