They have used hemp - a variety of cannabis which has many industrial applications including in textiles and insulation - and flax - the plant that linen is made of - to make an experimental footbridge to test the materials' load-bearing properties. "Actually it's the first 'bio-based' bridge in the world, as far as we know," said Rijk Blok, an assistant professor of structural design at the Eindhoven University of Technology. The developers - at several Dutch colleges and companies - are using sensors to monitor the bridge's performance as people walk and run over it for a year. They first had to demonstrate that the bridge could withstand a load of 500 kilograms per square meter in laboratory stress tests before building permission was granted. "This was our research - trying to find out: Can they be used in a structural load-bearing capacity?

Source: Standard Digital January 19, 2017 07:08 UTC