Novel efficient flame-retardant, smoke suppression and antibacterial treatment for cotton fabrics by surface graft copolymerization

Research on functional cotton fabrics has been focused on flame retardancy and antibacterial propertie to address the hazard of fire and harmful microorganisms. However, flame retardant and antibacterial treatments face the problems of cumbersome processes and unsatisfactory performance due to compatibility issues between additives and the nondurability of functional cotton fabrics. Herein, we prepared multifunctional cotton fabrics (DAM-CF-Cl) based on surface graft copolymerization of three vinyl monomers, namely diethyl methacryloyl phosphoramidate, 3-allyl-5, 5-dimethylhydantoin (ADMH, N-halamine precursor monomer) and N, N'-methylenebisacrylamide, which exhibited notably enhanced flame retardant, smoke suppression and antibacterial properties compared to the widely adopted complex methods. Compared to control cotton fabrics, the limiting oxygen index of DAM-CF-Cl containing fabrics improved from 18 to 27.6%, and the heat and smoke production of DAM-CF-Cl equipped samples exhibited a conspicuously decreasing tendency in cone calorimetry tests. In addition, due to the introduction of the N-halamine structure of ADMH, the efficient and rapid antibacterial properties of DAM-CF-Cl were confirmed. This work provides a new insight into a convenient method for comprehensive multifunctional treatment of textiles.