‘Green’ surface treatment forrnwater-repellent cotton fabrics

摘要

An environment-friendly ‘green’ method to obtain water-repellent (hydrophobic) cotton fabrics has been developed.rnAliphatic fatty chains were grafted onto cotton (cellulose) fiber surface to decrease the surface energy and, thus,rnobtain water repellency. A benign accelerator was used to facilitate the reaction between fatty acids and cellulosicrnhydroxyl groups. Microwave heating, an energy-efficient method, was used to reach the reaction temperature. Fattyrnanhydride, considered to have a higher reactivity than fatty acids, was initially prepared. This process was monitoredrnusing high-performance liquid chromatography and attenuated total reflectance-Fourier transform infraredrn(ATR-FTIR) techniques. The effects of fatty acid chain length as well as microwave heating parameters on thernhydrophobicity of the cotton fabrics were studied. The resulting hydrophobic cotton fabrics were characterizedrnby water contact angle, laundry durability test, tensile test, and ATR-FTIR spectroscopy. The green methodrndeveloped here resulted in a hydrophobic cotton fabric with a water contact angle of over 137° (± 3°). Further, thernhydrophobicity was shown to be permanent and lasted for 37 cycles of laboratory laundry washes (equivalent tornover 185 regular washes). ATR-FTIR results confirmed the grafting of fatty acids on cotton fabrics.