Multicomponent fibers comprising starch and polymers
AssigneeThe Procter & Gamble Company
InventorsEric Bryan Bond, Jean-Philippe Marie Autran, Larry Neil Mackey, Isao Noda, Hugh Joseph O'Donnell, Dean Van Phan
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Abstract
The present invention is directed to multicomponent fibers. The fibers may be in a side-by-side, sheath-core, segmented pie, islands-in-the-sea configuration, or any combination of configurations. Each component of the fiber will comprise destructurized starch and/or a thermoplastic polymer. The present invention is also directed to nonwoven webs and disposable articles comprising the multicomponent fibers. The nonwoven webs may also contain other synthetic or natural fibers blended with the multicomponent fibers of the present invention.
Claims8
A nonwoven web comprising multicomponent fibers having a diameter of less than 100 micrometers and having a configuration selected from the group consisting of sheath-core, islands-in-the-sea, ribbon, segmented pie, side-by-side, and combinations thereof;
- wherein the multicomponent fibers comprise destructurized starch having a molecular weight in the range from 10,000 g/mol to 2,000,000 g/mol;
- thermoplastic polymer having a molecular weight of less than 500,000 g/mol, and combinations thereof;
- wherein each component of the multicomponent fibers comprises at least one of the destructurized starch and the thermoplastic polymer.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.