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Abstract
Nonwoven products continue to grow because of their unique structure, properties, and their versatile applications, which include filters, absorbent products, and stretchable medical nonwovens. Stretchable meltblown and spunbond webs can be produced from elastomeric polymers such as polyurethanes and olefin copolymers. Current research is to produce elastomeric nonwovens containing cotton by appropriate process combinations. Two main approaches, one to produce nonwoven composites by hydroentangling cotton webs onto preformed meltblown/spunbond webs, and the other to coat (water-based) polyurethanes on hydroentangled cotton nonwovens were investigated. The composite structures produced by various combinations were evaluated for their structure and physical properties such as pore size, porosity, fiber structure, tensile strength, and absorbency. Adding cotton into elastic webs enhances the performance such as absorbency and comfort of synthetic fiber products. Also, stretchability and stretch recovery of the webs showed improvement as determined by cyclic loading and unloading tests.