Multifunctional cotton fabric with durable antibacterial, superhydrophobicity, and UV resistance based on Ag@TiO 2 Janus nanoparticles

Abstract

Abstract The market demand for multifunctional cotton fabric is increasing. However, the key of developing cotton fabric with multiple functions is how to solve the problem of functional combination. In this study, silver@titanium dioxide Janus nanoparticles (Ag@TiO2 Janus nanoparticles) were synthesized by Pickering emulsion polymerization and finished on the epoxy modified cotton fabric (Ag@TiO2 Janus/E-cotton fabric). The Ag@TiO2 Janus nanoparticles had asymmetric Janus structure, that one side being silane with hydrophilic amino group was covalently bonded with the epoxy group on the cotton fabric fibers and the other side being silane with hydrophobic long-chain alkane was faced the environment, which was to endow the cotton fabric durably superhydrophobic, UV resistance, and antibacterial. Characterization by SEM, XRD, EDS, EDS, FT-IR and TG verified the finishing of the cotton fabric with Ag@TiO2 Janus nanoparticles. Ag@TiO2 Janus/E-cotton fabric had a water contact angle of 160, after 50 wear cycles, the contact angle at the damaged part could still reach 152. Compared with raw cotton fabric, the antibacterial rate of Ag@TiO2 Janus/E- cotton fabric to Escherichia coli (E. coli) and Streptococcus Urealyticus (S. aureus) is more than 95%. After 8 ultrasonic washing cycles, the antibacterial rate still maintained more than 80%. The UV protection performance of the finished cotton fabric was improved by 82.3%.