Since the invention of nylon, industrial fibers have invaded technology and our daily lives. An important part of their properties comes from their particular structure, characterised by the more or less perfect alignment of long polymeric molecules.

To understand and improve these materials, it is important to know their atomic structure, i.e. the way these chains organise and interact. This can be achieved thanks to X-ray fiber diffraction. Unfortunately, this technique is unable to observe certain key structural aspects, such as hydration or hydrogen bonds, which are direct pre-requisites of the physical properties that need to be controlled.

On the other hand, neutron fiber diffraction is well suited to this type of measurement.