Recently, Scandinavian science and design students have developed a promising new member of the cellulose family: Ioncell-F, which is a textile created from plant material and ionic liquid. Like other cellulose fabrics, Ioncell-F is also a wood-based fibre and is produced by dissolving wood chips into an ionic liquid to obtain a pulp, which is further processed to create the finished fibres that can be spun into yarn. The ionic liquid and wood pulp form a solid bond due to which this fibre is much stronger in comparison to viscose. While viscose fibres weaken when wet, the fibres of Ioncell-F stay steady and do not change.
Regardless of the tedious and complex production methods involved, the resulting fabric made of all-natural materials, has a high water retention property and yields no toxic chemical residue. Ioncell-F requires much less water for production, even lesser than rayon. The fabric is still under research and testing, in order to create a product that can be scaled up for mass-production.