Wood as Raw Material: Source, Structure, Chemical Composition, Growth, Degradation and Identification focuses on the scientific advancements in general forestry. This book discusses the value of wood as a raw material as looked upon from biological, botanical, and technical perspective. Organized into 12 chapters, this book starts with an overview of the importance of forest trees as sources of wood. This text then examines the chemical composition and ultrastructure of wood. Other chapters explain the biological mechanisms of wood and bark formation by forest trees. This book discusses as well the certain fundamental relationships between tree growth and wood structure. The final chapter deals with wood identification in North America and European forest tree species. This book is a valuable resource for students engaged in the study of forest management, wood science and technology, tree physiology, silviculture, forest soils, forest genetics, forest engineering, pulp and paper technology, forest and wood pathology, and other specialized areas. Foresters and technologists will also find this book useful.

Much information is available for specific gravity and other properties of wood and bark, but it is widely scattered in the literature. This paper compiles information for estimation of biomass for 156 tree species found in North America for use in national forest inventory applications. We present specific gravities based on average green volume as well as 12 percent moisture content volume for calculation of oven-dry biomass. Additional information is included on bark thickness, bark voids, and bark percentages by species and green and dry weight of wood and bark. --

Wood-based materials are CO2-neutral, renewable, and considered to be environmentally friendly. The huge variety of wood species and wood-based composites allows a wide scope of creative and esthetic alternatives to materials with higher environmental impacts during production, use and disposal. Quality of wood is influenced by the genetic and environmental factors. One of the emerging uses of wood are building and construction applications. Modern building and construction practices would not be possible without use of wood or wood-based composites. The use of composites enables using wood of lower quality for the production of materials with engineered properties for specific target applications. Even more, the utilization of such reinforcing particles as carbon nanotubes and nanocellulose enables development of a new generation of composites with even better properties. The positive aspect of decomposability of waste wood can turn into the opposite when wood or wood-based materials are exposed to weathering, moisture oscillations, different discolorations, and degrading organisms. Protective measures are therefore unavoidable for many outdoor applications. Resistance of wood against different aging factors is always a combined effect of toxic or inhibiting ingredients on the one hand, and of structural, anatomical, or chemical ways of excluding moisture on the other.