Cotton fabric graft copolymerization using microwave plasma. II. Physical properties

Abstract

Microwave plasma treatments were applied to lightweight cotton fabric with oxygen, nitrogen, and argon at various microwave power levels and exposure times. The results showed significant effects from the type of plasma, microwave power, and treatment time on the fabric weight loss. Oxygen plasma treatment generates higher weight loss than argon plasma and nitrogen plasma. The breaking strength of the treated fabric was affected mainly by longer exposure time to the plasma. The active centers created within the cellulose macromolecules were used to initiate copolymerization reactions with the vinyl laurate monomer [CH 3 (CH 2 ) 10 COOCHACH 2 ]. The grafted cotton fabric showed excellent water repellency properties. Repeated home laundering of the treated cotton fabrics revealed no significant effect on the water contact angle or on the quantity of grafted vinyl laurate monomer as determined by universal attenuated total reflectance Fourier transform IR, demonstrating the good durability of the treatment that was applied.

Effects on surface properties of natural bamboo fibers treated with atmospheric pressure argon plasma

“…It has been reported that the weight loss of the plasma-treated fiber is essentially due to the cleaning of the surface contaminants and the etching of the fiber. 18 So the results give the indirect evidence that the plasma cleaning and etching effects become more intense with longer treatment times or larger plasma powers.…”

Plasma modification of natural cellulosic fibres

“…The fabric strength losses due to the plasma treatments were only a fraction of the losses experienced with traditional textile fi nishing resin. 24 Besides plasma activation with non-polymerisable gases and plasmainduced grafting of various monomers, it is also possible to modify cotton surfaces by means of plasma polymerisation, i.e. deposition of ultra-thin layers directly from the gas phase in the plasma.…”

“…It has been established that plasma treatment plays a key role in the enhancement of textile fi bres and fabrics properties, such as improved wettability, dyeing, water repellency, lowered moisture content, and decreased surface resistivity. 24 Several studies on plasma surface modifi cation of cellulose-based textiles have been conducted, using glowdischarge technology at low pressure [22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40] as well as barrier discharge and corona treatments at atmospheric pressure. [41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50] In both cases, active particles such as radicals, ions, electrons and photons are generated, which under reduced pressure have a much larger free path length as compared with the process at atmospheric pressure.…”

In Textiles

“…It has been observed that a small level of grafting (10% grafting level) increases the breaking strength of the fabric, which of course is leveled at higher percentage of grafting. Similarly, vinyl laurate has been graft polymerized on cotton fabric after generating active radical sites onto it using 2.45 GHz microwave plasma [24,25] . Among different gas media, argon plasma has been found to create more active sites [24] .…”

“…Plasma -induced grafting of vinyl laurate resulted in stable cellulose -vinyl laurate copolymers. This plasma -induced hydrophobic fi nishing on textiles is found to be quite durable, and such treatment practically does not affect the strength property, unlike the traditional resin fi nishing by wet processing, which usually results in high strength loss of cotton textiles [25] .…”