Assessing banana pseudostem sap–treated cotton fabric’s physical characteristics: implications for reactive dyeing applications

The textile chemical processing industry is one of the significant contributors to polluting the environment. The alternative way to reduce the effluent load is to introduce bio-based substances in the dyeing process. Banana pseudostem sap (BPS) solution has unique features of staining the cotton material, and it is difficult to remove and requires more washings. This aspect has been used in the present investigation to treat the cotton fabric with BPS and to assess the physical characteristics for potential application. Fresh extract of banana sap has been collected, purified, and applied to pre-treated cotton fabric using padding mangle at 100% expression. The physical properties, morphology, low-stress mechanical properties, and color indices of untreated and treated cotton fabrics were evaluated. The bending modulus and crease recovery angle of the treated cotton fabric were increased, but the tear strength of cotton fabric was reduced. SEM investigation confirms the presence of sap on the surface of the fabric. Low-stress mechanical properties were also performed and found that the total hand value after the treatment was increased from 1.89 to 3.97. Spectrophotometric analyses revealed a slight variance in the K/S value between samples treated with BPS and untreated samples, with values of 0.066 and 0.087, respectively. Thus, this study suggests that treating cotton fabric with BPS is sustainable and does not result in many changes in the physical properties of native cotton fabric that would impact subsequent processes like dyeing.