Bleaching of Cotton/polyamide fabrics with enzymes and peracetic acid

ABSTRACT Presently biotechnology plays an important role especially in the field of environmental protection. In the textile industry, enzymes are often used in many technological processes as they are ecological. This study attempted to introduce the bio‐processes in the conventional scouring and bleaching preparation of cotton/polyamide (PA) fabric. We investigated the utilization of peracetic acid formed in situ from reaction of tetraacetylethylenediamine with sodium perborate to affecting bleaching process by using lipase, protease, cellulase, pectinase enzymes. Fabric wettability, tensile strength, whiteness index were taken as a measure of the extent of cotton/PA bleaching. The optimized bleaching recipe and processing were compared with conventional process. Results obtained that, cotton/PA fabric bleached with peracetic acid and either lipase, protease, cellulase or pectinase enzyme shows excellent wettability and acceptable whiteness index. The optimum bleaching recipe consists of 20 g/L, tetraacetylethylenediamine; 12 g/L, sodium perborate; 2 g/L, enzymes; and 1 g/L non‐ionic wetting agent; the treatment was carried out at 60 °C for 45 min. This bio‐process achieved high quality cotton/PA fabric whiteness to the conventional system at much shorter batch times and with significantly reduced fabric strange lost and alkali consumption, which would be beneficial to the textile industry. © 2014 Curtin University of Technology and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.