Creep and stress relaxation behavior for natural cellulose crystal of wood cell wall under uniaxial tensile stress in the fiber direction

We investigated the temporal changes in creep and stress relaxation behavior in both microscopic crystalline cellulose and macroscopic strain of wood specimen using Japanese cypress (Chamaecyparis obtusa Endl.) to understand the viscoelastic properties of wood cell walls. Specimens 600 µm in thickness were observed by the X-ray diffraction and submitted to tensile load. The crystal lattice strain of (004) plane and macroscopic strain of specimen were continuously detected during creep and stress relaxation tests. It was found that the creep compliance based on macroscopic strain showed a gradual increase after instantaneous deformation due to loading and then the parts of creep deformation remained as permanent strain after unloading. On the other hand, crystal lattice strain showed a different behavior for macroscopic strain; it kept a constant value after instantaneous deformation due to loading and then increased gradually after a certain period of time. These differences between macroscopic and microscopic levels were never found in the stress relaxation tests in this study. Relaxation modulus at the macroscopic level only showed a decreasing trend throughout the relaxation process. However crystal lattice strain kept a constant value during the macroscopic relaxation process. In addition, the microfibril angle (MFA) of wood cell wall has a role of mechanical behavior at microscopic level; crystal lattice strains were smaller with increasing MFA at both creep and relaxation processes. Creep compliance and stress relaxation modulus at the macroscopic level decreased and increased with increasing MFA, respectively. Our results on the viscoelastic behavior at microscopic level evidenced its dependency on MFA.