Identification of Fibers of Woody and Non-woody Plant Species in Pulp and Papers

Now a days the paper factories, which because of environmental issues and lack of forest sources, use waste papers, need to identify fibers in raw materials to improve quality of recycled papers. In order to evaluate feasibility of fibers identification, papers of 9 Iranian important factories (12 different papers) were sampled and the frequency of identified species in papers was recorded in many microslides, prepared from the papers according to ISO 9184-1 (Anon., 1990). The morphological and anatomical characteristics of Iranian hardwoods already been studied and the valuable atlases were used for the identification of exotic fibers. The results showed that identification of paper fibers was feasible. The vessel elements, specially shape, spiral thickness, perforation plates and ray pits on vessels were the important features in the identification of hardwoods. The type of cross field pits on tracheids were the main diagnostic features for softwoods identification and parenchyma, epidermal cells and vessel elements for non-woody plants. The softwoods of Pinus spp., Larix sp., and Picea sp., the hardwoods of Populs sp., Fagus sp., Betula sp., Alnus spp., and Carpinus sp. and the non-woods of Wheat, Rice, Cotton and Corn were the most plentiful species found in sampled papers. Repetition of recycle, refine and beating in paper production process caused the destruction of fibers and so identification of paper fibers especially of similar fibers species (vessel elements and tracheids) was very difficult. In addition to knowing anatomical characteristics of woody and nonwoody plants, this practice is most important in identification of paper components.