Swapan Kumar Ghosh

Designing and Engineering of Jute Geotextile (JGT) for River Bank Protection and its Subsequent Implementation in River Phulahar

Jute geotextile (JGT) is gradually finding increasing acceptability among geotechnical engineers primarily because of its response to the growing global emphasis. The ecoconcordance of JGT concomitant with its other benefits like facility of production of tailor-made fabrics and price competitiveness have made it the best natural choice for different civil engineering constructions. Natural geotextile such as JGT has been experimented across the world as a bioengineering measure for river bank erosion control and the results are encouraging. Conventional methods of river bank protection in the erosion-prone stretches of the Indian rivers have proved to be a highly expensive proposition with respect to both capital investment and recurring maintenance costs. It is for this reason, Department of Jute and Fibre Technology, University of Calcutta, India in collaboration with National Jute Board, Ministry of Textiles, Government of India alongwith Irrigation and Waterways Department, Government of West Bengal, India has embarked upon designing and engineering JGT as per the site-specific requirement in a river in West Bengal portraying it as the main theme of this article.

An Evaluation of Drapeability of Jute Fabric

From the very inception of the Indian Jute Industry, jute fiber has proved its superiority over other fibers particularly in the area of packaging for food grains, in terms of its functionality and reusability due to its considerable tensile strength, low extensibility, and good dimensional stability, which is obviously the natural choice for packaging. One of the growing alternatives in today’s context is the emergence of technical textiles made out of natural fibers which includes geotextile products for geotechnical applications, agrotextile products as well as other such relevant areas. Jute geotextile can certainly be considered as a potential aspirant replacing majority of today’s popular synthetic products which are posing severe threats to our environment thereby adversely affecting the eco-congruity. During the application of jute fabrics of different types at the sites and even in designing garments in the Apparel Sector, it has been observed that the ability of the fabric to assume a graceful appearance of the contour is very crucial conveying the significance of drapeability of the jute fabric. An attempt has been made in this paper to study the effect of relevant property parameters and their comparative analysis on the drapeability of jute fabric as well as synthetic woven and nonwoven fabrics with respect to their end-use requirements.

Design and Engineering of Open Weave Jute Soil Saver for Potential Application in the Field of Soil Erosion Control and Hill Slope Management

Out of several natural agents causing extensive damages to roads, landslides can claim to be a major destroyer. There are several causes for landslides such as hazardous ground conditions, landform configuration adversities, occasionally occurring natural physical forces and anthropogenic impact on the environment. In such vulnerable situations the top soil on hill slopes get disintegrated due to intensive precipitation or shaking due to tremors and eventually flows down rapidly down the slope. The situation deserves the search for a biocover which can reduce the velocity of overland flow and entrap detached soil particles thereby controlling top soil loss. Jute Geotextile (JGT) if properly designed can fulfill the said criteria besides facilitating growth of vegetation. This paper discusses optimization of property parameters of open weave Jute Geotextile in tune with different parameters of design concerning protection of hill slope along with comparative analysis of the results of different tests on one hand and determination of tolerance limit of the prime property parameters of the developed JGT samples, on the other, which have been employed in different case studies to prove their potentiality and technoeconomic viability.

Synthesis of methylcellulose/cellulose nano-crystals nanocomposites: Material properties and study of sustained release of ketorolac tromethamine

Non-toxic nanocomposites based bio-films obtained from methylcellulose (MC) can reduce environmental problems associated with synthetic polymers. A new facile route for the isolation of cellulose nano-crystals (CNC) from jute waste is successfully utilized here. The fabrication of CNC reinforced MC nanocomposites by film casting technique and the studies of the effect of CNC on the properties of the MC based nanocomposites have been reported. The synthesized nanocomposites have shown improved UV resistance, mechanical, barrier, and thermal properties. FTIR results established the physicochemical compatibility between the drug, MC and CNC in nanocomposites. In vitro permeation studies performed by using Franz diffusion cell revealed diffusion mediated sustained drug release from the devices due to the presence of interaction between MC and CNC through H-bonding, electrostatic interaction between the hydrophilic polymer/CNC chains with the drug and the formation of tortuous path. The nanocomposites can be used for edible packaging and transdermal drug delivery.

Study of the effect of different weave constructions on the drapeability of jute woven fabric

The growing global concern for environment on one hand and the alarming danger of carbon footprint generation along with non-biodegradability and higher toxicity generation from the use of synthetic fibres on the other have created a dire need to come back to natural fibres. During the application of fabrics at the sites for geotextile application and even in designing garments in the apparel sector, it has been observed that the ability of the fabric to assume a graceful appearance of the contour is very crucial in conveying the significance of drapeability of the natural fibre-made fabric. An attempt has been made in this work to evaluate the effect of different weave constructions on the drapeability of jute-woven fabrics to justify their application on the sites.

Design and development of woven jute geotextiles for potential applications in the field of geotechnical constructions

The global growth of Geosynthetics for the last few decades or so has been substantially enhancing at an average of 10% per annum. Within the domain of geotextile, jute geotextile (JGT), a class of natural technical textile has carved out a niche in this emerging technology. Though far behind its man-made counterpart in growth, its effectiveness in addressing a host of different geotechnical problems and more importantly its eco-congruity is gaining increasing acceptability worldwide. The major uses of JGT are in road construction – low- and medium-volume roads in particular, soil erosion control, etc. Traditional sacking quality jute-woven fabrics (both plain and twill weaves) are being used in the above-mentioned applications. But use of conventional jute sacking fabrics being not application-specific and function-oriented deserves rethinking on adoption of the conventional jute fabrics used for flexible packaging in road construction, soil erosion control as well as other geotechnical construction. It is in this context that development of potentially important JGT for strengthening rural roads as well as in river bank protection assumes significance. It was realized that such JGT should be woven whose property parameters should be functionally apt for serving the purpose. The paper outlines a structured approach to fabric engineering related to JGT in tune with different prime parameters of design concerning rural road construction and river bank protection along with optimization and standardization of the fabric by comparative analysis of the different tests results of property parameters of the developed JGT samples.

Development of an Innovative Bituminized Jute Paving Fabric (BJPF) Along with its Commercial Field Trials for Potential Application in the Field of Geotechnical Construction with an Eye Towards Global Concern

In the last quarter of the twentieth century, a new class of materials, Geosynthetics, emerged prospectively leading significant innovation in the design of geotechnical and geoenvironmental systems. Geotextiles have proven to be among the most versatile and techno-economically viable ground modification materials playing a significant role in modern pavement design and maintenance techniques. With the growing environmental concern across the globe, technologists, researchers have inclined towards the natural geotextile where Jute Geotextile (JGT) is one of the potential candidates. But, JGT has been restricted mainly as underlay in road construction. Hence, there is an urgent need to design and develop a precise innovative fabric as overlay on existing pavements and other emerging civil works to stay technically and economically competitive in the global market. Such a fabric will not only prove techno-economically viable but will also reduce the carbon foot-print generation to a large extent. This paper delineates the development of Grey Jute Paving Fabric (GJPF) followed by its bituminization with suitable type and grade of bitumen to develop Bituminized Jute Paving Fabric (BJPF). The BJPF will enhance the life of the overlay thereby reducing the cost of maintenance as well as serving as a partial substitute of bitumen mastic.