Grafting of chitosan-acrylamide hybrid on the wool: Characterization, reactive dyeing, antioxidant and antibacterial studies.

This study presents a new approach to enhance reactive dye uptake and functional finishing of wool yarns via simple grafting with synthesized chitosan-acrylamide (Ch-Ac) hybrid. To this, Ch-Ac was synthesized and characterized with fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) techniques. Then, Ch-Ac was grafted on wool, characterized with FTIR, SEM, and weight gain analysis and dyeability with two commercial reactive dyes. Results showed that Ch-Ac treated wool could be dyed at lower temperatures (ca. 40 °C), times (ca. 30 min), and amount of reactive dye (2% owf) as compared to raw wool. Also, deeper shades not obtainable in conventional dyeing could be attained using Ch-Ac treated wool. In addition, Ch-Ac treatment imparted very good radical scavenging and excellent antibacterial activity against gram-negative (E. coli) and gram-positive (S. aureus) bacteria. Color fastness results confirmed that Ch-Ac treatment had no adverse effect on durability of dyes against washing, light, rubbing and perspiration. The results of this study clearly indicated that Ch-Ac can be used in eco-friendly functional finishing of wool with enhanced reactive dye uptake, minimized residual dye in wastewater, saving in consumption of chemicals, energy, and time of dyeing.