A study at the University of Kentucky is looking for more efficient ways to help repair the commonwealth’s aging infrastructure. Kentucky’s bridges are deteriorating, many were built to last around 50 years but the age of many of those structures are much older. A team at UK’s College of Engineering is looking at an unusual material to help with the construction process: human hair.
Dr. Issam Harik is a professor of civil engineering at UK. In an interview with WEKU, he said it would be just like using any other natural fiber.
“So, if you’re using wool, you make a yarn out of it and then a fabric, and that fabric you can shape it any way you want. You apply on it, a binder to hold that shape. That is what we do with the carbon fiber and what we did with the hemp fiber. When you look at natural fiber, human hair is a wonderful and abundant fiber that grows anywhere.”
He said human hair is stronger than many people think.
“Average human hair, since really there is no consistency in the hair we get, we collect the hair from a salon, so the average strength of a human is around 30-thousand pounds per square inch, about half the yield strength of the steel, so, as a fiber, it is strong.”
Harik said not only is it strong, but it is also readily available and free in most cases. It is cleaned and treated and then can be worked into the material to help strengthen concrete. This study is in its early stages and Harik expects this method to start being applied in real world scenarios during the next academic year.
The team Catstrong is leading the research and is primarily made up of UK students and even includes some high school students.
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