National Textile Center Funded for the 11^th Year

By Dr. David Buchanan, Associate Dean

of Research and Extension

            The National Textile Center, a research consortium including Auburn University, Clemson University, Georgia Institute of Technology, North Carolina State University, Philadelphia University, and the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth,  has received $10,000,000 in funding from the Department of Commerce for the period May 1, 2001 to April 30, 2002.  The portion coming to the College of Textiles is approximately $2,300,000.

            NTC was formed 11 years ago to enhance the knowledge base that drives the momentum of U. S. industry competitiveness.  Its goals are: To discover, design and develop new materials, innovative and improved manufacturing and integrated systems essential to the success of a modern U. S. textile enterprise; to train personnel, establish industrial partnerships and create transfer mechanisms to ensure the utilization of technologies developed and to strengthen the nation’s textile research and educational efforts by uniting diverse experts and resources in unique collaborative projects.  To learn more about the National Textile Center, please visit www.ntcresearch.org.

Current College of Textiles research efforts funded by this program include the following:

·         Environmentally Benign, Closed-loop Preparatory Processes

·         Automated Garment Development from Body Scan Data

·         A Novel Non-aqueous Fabric Finishing Process

·         Information Engineering: The Value-Adding Key

·         Fundamental Dye Diffusion and Surface Treatment

·         Fiber Motion and Yarn Forming in High Speed Air Flows

·         Lewis Acid-Base Complexation of Polyamides

·         Applications of Micromachines in Fabric Formation

·         Improving the Thermal Stability of Textile Processing Aids

·         Business-to-Business Collaboration in a Softgoods E-supply Chain

·         3-D Electronic Imaging of Fabric Qualities by On-Line Yarn Data Analysis

·         Novel Textile Chemistry for Dense Gas Fluids

·         Modeling of Thermal Protection Outfits for Fire Exposure

·         Theory of Constraints and Speech Act Theory for New Products

·         Emerging Apparel Supply Chain Configurations