Research internship part 3

Hello Everyone!

This is my last post, and my internship period is coming to an end.

Last time I wrote here it was the beginning of May, and now as the month is drawing to a close I realise a lot has changed.

First of all, I finally got to see paper yarn in real life! While I had seen some samples in the labs, nothing compares to a properly finished piece. Last week I visited the partner company for the project and discussed the yarn and its products with the production manager. A lot came up during our "interview", like early production problems, machine requirements, design considerations and possible market expansions. This visit and interview gave me the possibility of feeling the products for myself and to discuss them and their future developments. It is hard to describe how these products look and feel, so here is a picture I took!

With the company visit and interview I managed to collect quite a lot of data for my report, and after some discussion with my supervisor, I now have a pretty focused topic which relates to paper yarn, but not to the early stages of the research; which would have been too much.

In the end, this internship allowed me to explore a relatively unknown topic from two points of view: the economic side when developing the feasibility model, and the manufacturing side later. In both cases I realised how this project can have a huge impact on future sustainability and future textile manufacturing processes. 

I hope I will be able to explore even more of this topic next year with my thesis.

Have a great summer everyone!

Sara