Harnessing of novel tailored modified pregelled starch-derived products in sizing of cotton textiles

Several researches and developmental work efforts were made to synthesize what is called tailored polymeric materials with new characteristics based on pregelled starch through a number of processes, which in turn entailed several chemical treatments. This was done by subjecting the pregelled starch as a starting substrate to acid hydrolysis to obtain pregelled starch having different molecular sizes. The latter were carbamoylethylated using acrylamide and sodium hydroxide at different duration, and then grafted with different monomers using potassium permanganate/citric acid redox system for initiating grafting. Furthermore, harnessing of the newly tailored pregelled starch-derived products as sizing agent of cotton textiles was studied systematically. It is shown from the data that (a) the extent of carbamoylethylation expressed as N% increases by increasing the extent of hydrolysis and duration; (b) the graft yield expressed as mmol monomer/100 g sample of different monomers onto carbamoylethylated pregelled starch and carbamoylethylated hydrolyzed pregelled starches increases by increasing the extent of carbamoylethylation and the degree of hydrolysis, and follows the order: methacrylamide > methacrylonitrile > methacrylic acid; and (c) cotton fabrics sized with grafted carbamoylethylated hydrolyzed pregelled starch acquire higher mechanical properties, i.e., tensile strength, elongation at break, and abrasion resistance values than hydrolyzed pregelled starches, carbamoylethylated pregelled starch, and carbamoylethylated hydrolyzed pregelled starches. Using the above tailored modified pregelled starch-derived products in sizing of cotton textiles contributed to the reinforcement of the cotton textile after sizing to over come the forced loss in fabrics/yarns during spinning process, as shown above. (C) 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Adv Polym Techn 31: 5262, 2012; View this article online at . DOI 10.1002/adv.20234