Today, mainly man-made materials such as carbon and glass fibres are used to produce composite parts in aviation. Renewable materials such as natural fibres or bio-sourced resin systems have not found their way into aviation, yet. The project ECO-COMPASS aims to evaluate the potential applications of ecologically improved composite materials in the aviation sector in an international collaboration of Chinese and European partners. Natural fibres such as flax and ramie will be used for different types of reinforcements and sandwich cores. Furthermore, the bio-based epoxy resins to substitute bisphenol-A based epoxy resins in secondary structures are under investigation. Adapted material protection technologies to reduce environmental influence and to improve fire resistance are needed to fulfil the demanding safety requirements in aviation. Modelling and simulation of chosen eco-composites aims for an optimized use of materials while a life cycle assessment aims to prove the ecological advantages compared to synthetic state-of-the-art materials. In this paper, the status of selected ecologically improved materials will be presented with an outlook for potential application in interior and secondary structures.

By crystal structure search for Nb–C system, a P – x phase diagram was calculated and a new stable Nb ₂ C was predicted. The new phase is considered as a potential ultra-stiff and hard material.

The effect of plant-fiber paper or silver nanowires-loaded paper interleaves on the electrical conductivity and interlaminar fracture toughness of composites was studied. Highly conductive paper was prepared by surface-loaded silver nanowires. The percolation threshold appeared at about 0.4 g/m². The surface resistivity reached 2.3 Ω/sq when the areal density of silver nanowires was 0.95 g/m². After interleaving the conductive papers in the composite interlayers, in-plane electrical conductivity perpendicular to the fiber direction was increased by 171 times and conductivity through thickness direction was increased by 2.81 times. However, Mode I and Mode II interlaminar fracture toughness decreased by 67.3% and 66.9%, respectively. Microscopic analysis showed that the improvement of conductivity was attributable to the formation of an electrical conducting network of silver nanowires which played a role in electrical connection of carbon fiber plies and the interleaving layers. However, the density of the highly packed flat plant fibers impeded the infiltration of resin. The parallel distribution of flat fibers to the carbon plies, and poor resin-fiber interface made the interlaminar fracture occur mainly at the interface of plant fibers and resin inside the interleaves, resulting in a decline of the interlaminar fracture toughness. The surface-loading of silver nanowires further impeded the infiltration of resin in the densely packed plant fibers, resulting in further decline of the fracture toughness.