Oligomeric Maleic Acid as a New Nonformaldehyde Durable Press Finishing Agent for Cotton

Abstract

Wrinkle-free ” cotton slacks and shirts have become an increasingly popular fashion in recent years. However, most of the consumers are not aware of the fact that the finishing agents currently used to produce those “no-iron ” garments are based on formaldehyde. World Health Organization recently upgraded its assessment of formaldehyde ‘s toxicity to “carcinogenic to humans”. Formaldehyde vapor is released during a finishing process as well as during the life time of treated garments, thus presenting a health risk to both textile workers and consumers. Since 1990s, extensive efforts have been made to use formaldehyde-free crosslinking agents to replace the traditional formaldehyde-based reagents. Among those new durable press finishing agents, multifunctional carboxylic acids have become the most promising alternatives with 1,2,3,4-butanetetracarboxylic acid (BTCA) being the most effective one. BTCA was not commercially available until very recently and it is significantly more expensive than the traditional formaldehyde-based finishes. In this research, we studied the synthesis of oligomericpoly(maleic acid) (PMA) in an aqueous solution, and discovered that maleic acid (MA) is able to polymerize in an aqueous solution in the presence of NaH2PO2. We applied matrix-assisted laser desorption/adsorption mass spectroscopy to determine the molecular weight of the PMA and found that the majority of the PMA have degree of polymerization of 3-5. We found that the cotton fabric treated with PMA have wrinkle resistance similar to that treated with the conventional formaldehyde-basedfinishes with reduced tensile strength loss. The oligomeric PMA appears to be a highly effective and low-cost nonformaldehyde alternative for the textile industry to replace the traditional formaldehyde-based finishes.