Self-cleaning properties of bleached and cationized cotton using nanoTiO2: A statistical approach

Cationization is a novel treatment on cotton to produce fabric with new characteristics. Bleached cotton fabric has already been treated with nanoTiO2 (NTO) to create fabric with self-cleaning properties. However treatment of cationized cotton with NTO has not been reported. In this research, the self-cleaning properties of bleached and cationized cotton treated by NTO were compared and optimized using a statistical model. The bleached cotton was first cationized with 3-chloro-2-hydroxypropyl trimethyl ammonium chloride (Quat-188). The NTO particles were stabilized on the cotton surface using butane tetra carboxylic acid (BTCA) in the presence of sodium hypophosphite (SHP) under different curing conditions including UV irradiation (UV), high temperature (High temp) and a combination of UV and high temperature (UV–Temp). The central composite design (CCD) was used for different variables based on Design of Expert software. The appropriate model was obtained for each condition to create optimum color difference. The X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) were also employed to indicate the NTO particles on the fabric surface including the size of nanoparticles and their crystallinity.