A Bibliometric Review of Research Trends on Kenaf Fiber Reinforced Concrete

To prevent the excessive depletion of natural resources, sustainable development requires using alternate sustainable materials. Researchers in the field of advanced construction materials are increasingly paying attention to kenaf fibers as a "green" material because of their possible application in composites to advance sustainable development. However, there has been no attempt of scientometric analysis to investigate the comprehensive understanding of the present state of applications of kenaf fibers in reinforced concrete. The study aims to perform a bibliometric analysis of the existing kenaf fibers reinforced concrete literature and to provide a picture of the research status during the last ten years from 2013 to September 2022. There were 303 articles extracted from the Scopus database. The “VOSviewer” tool was employed to visualize the literature containing the most active scientific journals, countries, and highly used keywords in the field of fibers reinforced concrete. The outcomes showed that “Hybrid Composites”, “Impact Strength”, “Water Absorption”, “Scanning Electron Microscopy”, “Polypropylenes” and “Polymer Composite” have recently emerged as themes related to the applications of KFRC, and grabbed the interest of academics, may also offer future research opportunities. Additionally, according to the frequency of the keywords used, three important research domains associated with kenaf fibers within the concrete in the construction materials field have been identified, including “Mechanical Properties”, “Fiber Reinforced Plastics”, and “Tensile Strength”. Furthermore, the recent studies on the impact of kenaf fiber utilization on the structural performance of reinforced concrete are reviewed. Accordingly, the explanations related to research findings, suggestions for future studies have been provided on the incorporation of kenaf fibers reinforced concrete in civil engineering applications

Bioactive components of commiphora gileadensis plant for various medicinal applications: A bibliometric analysis

Herbal medicine is becoming increasingly popular all over the world. As an alternative to currently used antibiotics, there is a need to find naturally occurring substances from plants that contain bioactive components. Commiphora gileadensis is a significant medicinal plant that has been used historically and, in the future, where this tree species is important economically and medicinally. The medicinal potential of C. gileadensis stems from the presence of secondary phytoconstituents, which perform a variety of functions including antioxidant, antimicrobial, cytotoxic, anticancer, and antiviral. Several studies have been conducted to integrate the ecological and biological properties of C. gileadensis. However, no scientometric analysis has been attempted to investigate the holistic understanding of the plant. The study’s aim is to perform a bibliometric analysis of the plant literature on C. gileadensis and present a summary of research development from 2010 to September 2022. 40 documents were pulled from the Scopus database. To display the literature by country, scientific journal, and keyword, the VOSviewer tool was employed. The findings revealed that “Antibacterial,” “Antioxidant,” “Anti-microbial,” “Anticancer,” and “Sustainable Medicinal Plant” have recently risen to prominence as mainstream topics associated with this field, piqued the interest of academics, and may represent future research opportunities. Furthermore, based on the most keywords frequently utilized, seven important research domains linked with C. Gileadensis have been identified, including “Balm of Gilead”, “Balm of Judea”, “Apharsemon”, “Opobalsamum”, “Mecca Balsam”, “Besham (Becham)” and “Myrrha”. As a result, explanations for research findings and recommendations for future studies on the integration of C. Gileadensis usage and its valuable bioactive components for multi-Medicinal applications have been provided

Effect of sodium hydroxide on mechanical characteristics of kenaf fibers reinforced concrete

This article shows the experimental analysis of sodium hydroxide (NaOH) effects on the mechanical properties upon the addition of kenaf fibres to the concrete mixture. The compression and flexural tests were carried out on seven different concrete mixtures for 28 days to evaluate the mechanical characteristics. Hence, the experimental trials comprise of seven different mixtures of concrete; the control (without the addition of kenaf fibre) was represented as the first mixture. The following six concrete mixtures contain different kenaf fibre volume fractions (1% and 2%); they were treated with 1%, 3% and 6% of sodium hydroxide concentrations in order to investigate their performances. The experimental results show that the compressive and flexural strengths of kenaf fibres reinforced concrete increase as sodium hydroxide concentration increases. Besides, it is worth noting that the addition of kenaf fibres has an insignificant effect on the compressive strength of the concrete owing to the reduction in concrete density. Therefore, the results of this study demonstrated that the concrete flexural strength increased to up to 12%) upon the addition of 1% kenaf fibre associated with 6% NaOH. Moreover, the failure state increasingly changed to ductile from brittle

Behaviour of Reinforced Concrete Slabs with Steel Fibers

his paper investigates the potential effect of steel fiber added into reinforced concrete slabs. Four-point bending test is conducted on six slabs to investigate the structural behaviour of the slabs by considering two different parameters; (i) thickness of slab (ii) volume fraction of steel fiber. The experimental work consists of six slabs, in which three slabs are designed in accordance to Eurocode 2 to fulfil shear capacity characteristic, whereas, the other three slabs are designed with 17% less thickness, intended to fail in shear. Both series of slabs are added with steel fiber with a volume fraction of Vf = 0%, Vf = 1% and Vf = 2% in order to study the effect and potential of fiber to compensate the loss in shear capacity. The slab with Vf = 0% steel fiber and no reduction in thickness is taken as the control slab. The experimental result suggests promising improvement of the load carrying capacity (up to 32%) and ductility (up to 87%) as well as delayed in crack propagation for the slabs with Vf = 2%. In addition, it is observed that addition of fibers compensates the reduction in the slab thickness as well as changes the failure mode of the slab from brittle to a more ductile manner

An Overview of Using Steel Fibers in Reinforced Concrete Structural Elements to Improve Shear Reinforcement

Recently, several studies have been conducted to investigate the shear behaviour of steel fiber reinforced concrete (SFRC). Over the last few decades, steel fibers have been shown to be applicable and effective in improving the shear reinforcement. This paper presents a summary of the main findings from the primary research contributors. Besides discussion on the research efforts, recommendations for the future research in using steel fibers to improve shear reinforcement are provided. This paper conclude that using steel fibers in reinforced concrete slab can possibly reduce the thickness of slab and fibers has substantial effect to serve as part of shear reinforcement in reinforced concrete slab

Effect of kenaf fiber in reinforced concrete slab

The effect of kenaf fibers in reinforced concrete slab with different thickness is discusses and presented in this paper. Kenaf fiber is a type of natural fiber and is added in the reinforced concrete slab to improve the structure strength and ductility. For this study, three types of mixtures were prepared with fiber volume fraction of 0%, 1% and 2%, respectively. The design compressive strength considered was 20 MPa. Six cubes were prepared to be tested at 7th and 28th day. A total of six reinforced concrete slab with two variances of thickness were also prepared and tested under four-point bending test. The differences in the thickness is to study the potential of kenaf fiber to serve as part of shear reinforcement in reinforced concrete slab that was design to fail in shear. It was observed that, addition of kenaf fiber in reinforced concrete slab improves the flexural strength and ductility of the reinforced concrete slab. In the slab with reduction in thickness, the mode of failure change from brittle to ductile with the inclusion of kenaf fiber

Mechanical properties of steel/kenaf (hybrid) fibers added into concrete mixtures

This paper investigates the potential advantages of adding hybrid steel-kenaf fibers to concrete mixtures. Compression and flexural test were conducted on six concrete mixtures at 28 days to investigate the mechanical properties of the concrete. The experimental work consists of six concrete mixtures, in which the first mixture was a control mixture without adding any fiber. The following five concrete mixtures contain a total of 1% of volume fraction for steel, kenaf and a mixture of steel-kenaf (hybrid) fibers. Three ratios were considered for hybrid fibers with the ratios of 0.25/0.75, 0.5/0.5 and 0.75/0.25 for steel and kenaf fibers, respectively. From the investigation, it was observed that fibers have minimal effect on compressive strength of the concrete. However, the findings suggest promising improvement on the flexural strength of the concrete added with hybrid fiber (up to 86%) as well as manages to change the mode of failure of the beam from brittle to a more ductile manner