Effect of gamma radiation and natural daylight on the mechanical properties of fabricated textile polymers

It is of great importance to study the effect of ionizing radiation and natural daylight on the condensed materials because it may be used in the nuclear reactors , industrial satellites and space research. The present study is mainly concerned with the investigation of the effect of gamma radiation and the natural daylight on the mechanical properties of some textile polymers (cotton, nylon-6, polyester/cotton and wool/polyester blends). The results showed that cotton and nylon-6 fabrics lost their tensile strength (T.S.) and bursting strength, respectively, at rapid rates under the effect of gamma irradiation and the rates of loss became slower with the exposure to natural daylight. On the other hand, the blend fabrics (cotton /Polyester and wool/polyester) possessed stability of the mechanical properties with respect to gamma radiation, while the loss percent in T.S. was increased with increasing the exposure to daylight