Industrial and biomedical applications of fiber reinforced composites

Application of fiber-reinforced composites (FRC) in industrial and clinical improvement is evolving amid growing demand in all areas of innovative technology. Substantial benefits of FRCs have been adapted in sciences and engineering with possibility of further exploration. Part of the attractive properties of these composites is their renewability and biodegradability. These two salient properties have been adapted in automobile and aerospace industries to evolve automobile part and rotor blades formation respectively. The implication of FRCs in key components replacement has significantly reduced the entire payload of body weight system of either automobile vehicle or aircraft system with overall reduction in energy demand in these systems. Further to this, FRCs have enjoyed substantial patronage in plastic formation and all manner of industrial need. One may not be able to count huge number of FRCs in structural and building construction with substantial reduction in the cost of procurement of these materials. The foray into green materials have evolved electrically conductive fiber-reinforced materials which have been reported to be suitable for drug delivery systems, biomedical implants and tissue engineering. In several published papers, findings have revealed the application of FRCs in dental and medical implants. In this chapter, extensive works were done to x-ray the involvement of fiber-reinforced composite in medical and industrial application. Taking into consideration the voluminous nature of fiber reinforced materials, this work restricted the scope of this study to exclude metallic component of fiber reinforced composite while the attention was majorly on natural fiber reinforced composite. The impact of biodegradable materials in regenerative medicine also formed key area in this work highlighting their significance and shortcoming as reported in clinical practise. Concluding part of this chapter dwelled on the prospects and viabilities of the materials while considering their limitations in clinical works.