Abstract
High flame-retardant efficiency and good hand feeling are particularly critical in the application of cotton fabrics. Herein, a reactive flame retardant (PAzP) with ammonium phosphate ester groups was designed and bonded to cotton fabric through a dip-pad-cure process. The obtained PAzP-treated fabrics exhibited good hand feeling and high fire safety. The finishing process had no essential effect on the crystal structure of cellulose. With 11.8 wt% PAzP bonded, the attributes of the fabric's texture, including resilience, softness, and smoothness, were nearly indistinguishable from those of pristine fabric. Meanwhile, PAzP-treated fabric achieved a LOI value of 33.3% and self-extinguished immediately after removing the igniter in the vertical burning test. The material exhibited outstanding performance in the cone calorimeter test, demonstrating a remarkable decrease in both heat and smoke release, thus indicating its exceptional fire safety properties. The investigation of char residue and decomposed volatiles confirmed that PAzP functioned as a flame retardant by generating graphitized char residues, which limit the propagation of heat and oxygen and curtailed the emission of flammable volatiles in the condensed phase. Additionally, PAzP released a substantial amount of CO2, which mitigated the flammable volatiles and oxygen in the gaseous phase. Overall, this study presents a potential strategy for producing cotton fabric that possesses excellent fire safety and comfortable tactile properties.
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The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are not publicly available, but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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Acknowledgments
The authors thank the National Natural Science Foundation of China, Natural Science Foundation Project of Chongqing, Chongqing Science and Technology Commission, and The Science and Technology Research Program of Chongqing Municipal Education Commission.
Funding
We acknowledge the funding support of National Natural Science Foundation of China (22205028), Natural Science Foundation Project of Chongqing, Chongqing Science and Technology Commission (cstc2021jcyj-msxmX0370), the Science and Technology Research Program of Chongqing Municipal Education Commission (KJQN202200711), International Science and Technology Cooperation and Exchange Program of Sichuan Science and Technology Department (211552), The Key Laboratory of Flame Retardancy Finishing of Textile Materials, CNTAC (kf2022-003), and Joint Training Base Construction Project for Graduate Students in Chongqing (JDLHPYJD2021011).
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X-HS: conceptualization; data curation; data analysis; draft writing; manuscript revision; project administration. W-MX: sample preparation; data curation; formal analysis; data analysis; draft writing. S-JW: sample preparation; data curation; formal analysis; data analysis, draft writing. Q-YL: sample preparation; data curation; formal analysis. JDLV: sample testing; data analysis, manuscript revision. D-YW: conceptualization; formal analysis; supervision; manuscript revision, project administration.
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Shi, XH., Xie, WM., Wu, SJ. et al. Facile fabrication of high-efficiency reactive flame retardant toward cotton fabric with good hand feeling and high fire safety. Cellulose 30, 7313–7328 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10570-023-05306-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10570-023-05306-5