Provide a one page Summary of your research that is not commercial in confidence, and that can be published on the World Wide Web. Explain the main outcomes of the research and provide contact details for more information. It is important that the Executive Summary highlights concisely the key outputs from the project and, when they are adopted, what this will mean to the cotton industry.

SiroMat is an instrument that measures fibre maturity directly and accurately. Its advantage over other test methods is that it measures maturity directly and is able to measure the fibre to- fibre distribution of maturity in a specimen. Moreover the test time is around two minutes, which is comparable with other low volume instrument test times. SiroMat is currently undergoing technical trials with a view to preparing it for commercialisation.

In order for SiroMat to be taken up by the wider industry its utility needs to be realised by the wider research and commercial cotton testing and marketing segments. During a recent meeting with Uster Technologies (USA) interest was expressed in the SiroMat on this basis.

In order to continue to highlight its value SiroMat data will be recorded on samples from a wide number of Australian and international industry sponsored cotton breeding, agronomy and textile projects.

SiroMat is an automated version of the polarized light microscopy technique, which analyzes interference colors transmitted by cotton fibres when they are placed between crossed polars and a first order retardation plate. The percent areas of colors in images of fibre snippets relate directly to fibre maturity. Moreover, because fibres are analyzed on an individual basis a maturity distribution for a sample can also be measured. In this study SiroMat measurements are reported for blends comprising different proportions of cotton fibre picked from plants subjected to differential defoliation timing treatments. The proportion of immature fibres in each sample is correlated with measurements on the same samples of neps per gram made by the AFIS PRO. The motivation behind this study is based on the desire to manage the amount of immature fruit included in a crop, and how this relates to nep generation in the gin and spinning mill.

Fibre maturity is regarded as a central characteristic of cotton fibre through its direct and indirect correlation with physical and chemical properties of commercial and technical importance. SiroMat is an automated version of the polarized light microscopy technique, which analyzes interference colours transmitted by cotton fibres when they are placed between crossed polars and a first order retardation plate. The percent areas of colours in images of fibre snippets relate directly to fibre maturity. Moreover, because fibres are analyzed on an individual basis a maturity distribution for a sample can also be measured. In this study two sub-sets of cotton each with the same average Micronaire but with different fibre maturity values as measured by SiroMat were processed from raw fibre through to dyed finished knit fabric. The objective of the study was to examine the sensitivity of SiroMat average maturity and distribution values in predicting differences in griege yarn and dyed fabric quality. Results of the study demonstrate the relevance of SiroMat test results in terms of predicting fibre maturity and fineness related quality problems and in particular the potential for SiroMat to be used as a tool for managing dye uptake problems at the mill laydown.