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Why must synthetic fibres used in paper often be bonded with adhesives?
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Figure 1: Three common polymer structures. The linear, branched, and network architectures are represented (from top), respectively, by high-density polyethylene (HDPE), low-density polyethylene (LDPE), and phenol formaldehyde (PF). The chemical structure and molecular structure of highlighted regions are also shown.
Synthetic fibres used in papermaking must be bonded with adhesives because they lack the inherent bonding properties found in natural cellulose fibres.1
When natural cellulose fibres are beaten in water, they swell and naturally cement together as they dry due to interatomic forces of attraction, such as hydrogen bonding or van der Waals forces. In contrast, synthetic fibres do not possess this ability to bond spontaneously during the drying process. Consequently, to create a coherent sheet of paper from synthetic materials, an additional manufacturing step is required to add an adhesive that binds the fibres together.12