Directional Trans-Planar and Different In-Plane Water Transfer Properties of Composite Structured Bifacial Fabrics Modified by a Facile Three-Step Plasma Treatment

Abstract

Fabrics with moisture management properties are strongly expected to benefit various potential applications in daily life, industry, medical treatment and protection. Here, a bifacial fabric with dual trans-planar and in-plane liquid moisture management properties was reported. This novel fabric was fabricated to have a knitted structure on one face and a woven structure on the other, contributing to the different in-plane water transfer properties of the fabric. A facile three-step plasma treatment was used to enrich the bifacial fabric with asymmetric wettability and liquid absorbency. The plasma treated bifacial fabric allowed forced water to transfer from the hydrophobic face to hydrophilic face, while it prevented water to spread through the hydrophobic face when water drops were placed on the hydrophilic face. This confirmed one-way water transport capacity of the bifacial fabric. Through the three-step plasma treatment, the fabric surface was coated with a Si-containing thin film. This film contributed to the hydrophobic property, while the physical properties of the fabrics such as stiffness and color were not affected. This novel fabric can potentially be used to design and manufacture functional and smart textiles with tunable moisture transport properties.

Knit Architecture for Water-Actuating Woolen Knitwear and Its Personalized Thermal Management

“…Therefore, PTM clothing has made a profound contribution to healthcare textiles as well as smart textile industries. Numerous materials and approaches such as phase-change materials, − shape memory polymers, − smart membranes, − smart coating, smart spider silk, infrared (IR)-responsive materials, , nanoporous polyethylene, − living organisms, conductive polymers, , bifacial fabric, and wearable devices − have been developed to fabricate textiles with personal thermal management ability. However, the limitations of most of the materials are the slower response time, being harmful to nature, complex processability, and high cost, which confine their applications in the industrial scale.…”

Stearic Acid-Modified Starch/Chitosan Composite Sponge with Asymmetric and Gradient Wettability for Wound Dressing

“…The asymmetric coatings were also obtained on polyester fabric substrate via a fluoropolymer (PHFDMA) deposition method, and cotton fabric substrate via plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition . However, these methods still suffered the following drawbacks such as (1) the requirement of materials with natural superhydrophilicity; (2) strong dependence of the characteristics of the porous substrate, the health problems cases by the photogenerated reactive oxygen species (ROS); (3) the complicated preparation process and expensive reagents; (4) the cytotoxicity, bioaccumulation, and environmental toxicity of modification agent, which was not suitable for wound dressing. − In addition, the reported materials with asymmetric wettability were mainly filmwise materials (i.e., cotton fabric, polymer film), which possessed relatively low liquid absorbency. Although porous aerogels or sponges with three-dimensional (3D) architecture possessed highly improved liquid adsorption ability compared to filmwise materials, − they cannot avoid the infiltration of pathogenic microorganisms and wound dehydration .…”

Preparation and Characterization of a PU/(PAN/PVP) Unidirectional Moisture Transport Fibrous Membrane

“…To reduce the use of solvents, the researchers began to prepare single-guide wet textiles by surface deposition/polymerization. 11,12 Tian et al 13 prepared a single-guide wet textile by single-side vapor deposition. They placed the hydrophilic cotton fabric on a container containing perfluorooctane triethoxysilane and silanized the side in contact with steam to form a hydrophobic structure.…”