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1175
ISSN 1229-9197 (print version)
ISSN 1875-0052 (electronic version)
Fibers and Polymers 2016, Vol.17, No.8, 1175-1180
Bleaching of SeaCell
®
Active Fabrics with Hydrogen Peroxide
B. Cenkkut Gültekin*
Textile Engineering Department, Faculty of Technology, Marmara University, İstanbul 34722, Turkey
(Received January 26, 2016; Revised March 18, 2016; Accepted March 22, 2016)
Abstract: Seaweed-based SeaCell fibres have been considered as new materials for textile industry. In this study, seaweed-
based SeaCell Active fibres which have antifungal and antibacterial activity have been used. Simple, economic and green
process is applied to investigate the bleaching performance of SeaCell Active fabric. Bleaching process has been performed
in a laboratory scale dyeing machine by using H O at different concentrations. Also, different bleaching trials were carried
out by varying temperature, pH and process duration. Colour Measurements of the bleached SeaCell Active fabrics have
been characterized by utilizing Datacolor SF 600 +. Tristimulus and Whiteness Index values have been calculated according
to the CIELab system with D65/10 observer values. After the bleaching treatment, the obtained results reveal that SeaCell
Active fabric with satisfactory whiteness index and improved lightness (L) value can be obtained by processing the fabric at
90 C for 60 min in a bleaching bath with fixed pH 7.5 containing 30 ml/l H O. SEM images of untreated and bleached
SeaCell Active fabrics also show that some fibres have been damaged after bleaching process.
Keywords: Whiteness, Bleaching, SeaCell fabric, Antimicrobial fibres, Colour measurements
Introduction
Natural textile products can be easily damaged by
microorganisms such as pathogenic bacteria, molds, fungi,
odor-generating bacteria and viruses, which effects of human
health in a negative way. With the increasing consumer
awareness of health and hygiene issues, functionalization of
textiles has become very important and necessary element
[1,2]. One of the most popular and necessary functionalization is
the antimicrobial finishing [3]. In general, antimicrobial
textiles can be produced in two different ways including
impregnation of active agents to the final fabric or adding it
to fibre in the beginning. Various biocides, such as silver and
copper compounds, chitosan, zeolites, quartz, imidazoles
have been widely applied by impregnation for antimicrobial
finishing processes [4]. It is an easy method to obtain fabrics
with antimicrobial function by the finishing technology,
which is a traditional method, but durability performance of
fabrics against washing is generally not very good. Antimicrobial
fibres can be manufactured by adding antimicrobial agent
into the fibre polymer during the spinning [5-7]. Among the
various commercial antimicrobial yarns, SeaCell
®
Active is
the well-known product which produced by the second
mentioned method. SeaCell fibre is produced by Zimmer
Co. Ltd., based on Lyocell processing technology which is
environment-friendly, economically viable and highly flexible
method to manufacture an alternative man-made cellulosic
fibre [6,8]. In Lyocell process, cellulose is dissolved in non-
toxic aqueous solvent N-methylmorpholine-N-oxide. Then,
the ground seaweed, which is mainly coming from the
family of brown, red, green, and blue algae, added as
powder or suspension into the cellulose solution in order to
produce SeaCell
®
Pure fibres. Following, silver ions can be
added into the blend solution in activation phase of the
process to obtain SeaCell
®
Active fibres [8-13].
SeaCell
®
fibres have many health advantages with excellent
physical properties such as high tenacity and elongation
[14]. SeaCell
®
Active has an antibacterial and antifungal
effect. Therefore, it is generally used for bed sheets and
shirts for patients with atopic dermatitis, socks for persons
with transpiration problems or long-term exposure to tightly
closed shoes, underwear for diabetic patients and patients
with obesity, and also sportswear, home textiles and technical
textile applications [15].
So far, numerous articles have been published about the
SeaCell
®
fibres and textiles. Üreyen [5], evaluated the spinning
performance of SeaCell
®
Active/cotton blended open end
rotor yarns and antibacterial activity of knitted fabrics
obtained by these yarns. Hipler et al. [13], studied the
antibacterial and antifungal properties of SeaCell
®
Active
fibres in an in vitro test system. Flühr et al. [8], investigated
the healing properties of T-shirts made of SeaCell
®
Active
yarns which are dressed by patients with atopic dermatitis.
Brinsko [9], characterized optical and chemical properties of
SeaCell
®
fibres for forensic applications. Onofrei et al. [15],
studied the thermal comfort properties of knitted fabrics of
SeaCell
®
Pure/SeaCell
®
Active/cotton blended yarns for
active sportswear applications. Üreyen et al. [16] investigated
the silver content and antibacterial activity of knitted fabrics
obtained with SeaCell
®
Active/cotton blended yarns. Gültekin
et al. [17], studied the dyeability of SeaCell
®
Active woven
fabrics with reactive dyes by using ultrasonic energy, and
also, in another study, examined the thermal and flame
retardancy properties of woven fabrics obtained with SeaCell
®
Pure and SeaCell
®
Active yarns [18].
Besides the aforementioned benefits of the SeaCell
®
Active fibres, a specific problem usually occurs during the
production of SeaCell
®
Active fibres due to the oxidation of
*Corresponding author: cgultekin@marmara.edu.tr
DOI 10.1007/s12221-016-6181-9
1176 Fibers and Polymers 2016, Vol.17, No.8 B. Cenkkut Gültekin
silver caused by exposure to hydrogen sulphide or relative
humidity in the air, it turns into the form of black silver
sulphide.The colour of textile materials manufactured by
SeaCell
®
Active fibres changes from white to black-brown
as a result of reaction, which is the main disadvantage of the
SeaCell
®
Active fibres [19]. Therefore, in this study, it was
aimed to eliminate the colour change of as-produced
SeaCell
®
Active fabric with a “green” bleaching process by
using hydrogen peroxide to obtain optimum lightness and
whiteness value. It is noteworthy to mention that the
bleaching study of SeaCell
®
Active fabric, is the first
experimental study within the literature. Bleaching performance
of SeaCell
®
Active fabric has evaluated by varying hydrogen
peroxide concentrations, pH, process temperature and
duration.
Experimental
Materials
In this study, 100 % SeaCell
®
Active (SA) plain weaved
fabric has been used. The weight of fabrics is 130 g/m
2
,
warp and weft densities are 30 warp/cm and 30 weft/cm.
Hydrogen peroxide (%35) (H
2
O
2
), stabilizer, sodium carbonate
(Na
2
CO
3
), sodium hydroxide (NaOH) were purchased from
Merck.
Bleaching Method
The plain weaved 100 % SeaCellActive fabric is bleached
with H
2
O
2
(%35) at different concentrations (5, 10, 15, 20,
30 ml/l) with four different temperatures (60, 70, 80, 90
o
C)
and three different times (30, 45, 60 min), and four different
pH values (pH 7.5, 8, 9, 10). The recipe details and
bleaching processes used in the experimental work of this
study are given in Table 1 and Table 2, respectively.
Colour Measurements and Whiteness Index
The colour coordinates of bleached fabrics were measured
by the reflectance spectrophotometer (Datacolor SF 600 plus +)
coupled to a PC under D65 illuminant/10
o
observer value
with specular component included. Here, ΔL
*
denotes
lightness (where L
*
=100) and darkness (where L
*
=0), Δa
*
the difference between green (-a
*
) and red (+a
*
), and Δb
*
the
difference between yellow (+b
*
) and blue (-b
*
).
Whiteness Index is the situation of being 100 % whiteness
index of textile material with an ability of reflecting light.
CIE Whiteness Index WI (for 2
o
standard observer) or WI
10
(for 10
o
standard observer) formulates as shown below:
WI = Y + 800 (x
n
− x) + 1700 (y
n
− y)(1)
WI
10
= y
10
+ 800(x
n, 10
− x
10
) + 1700 (y
n,10
− y
10
) (2)
In this formula x, x
10
, Y, y
10
are the colorimetric values
calculated by the use of 2
o
and 10
o
standard observers
values under D65 illuminant. x
n
, x
n,10
, and y
n
, y
n,10
are the
cromatisite coordinates of D65 illuminant belonging to 2
o
and 10
o
standard observer. The ideal reflecting property for
Whiteness Index of diffusioner is 100.0 [20].
Results and Discussion
Effect of pH
pH has an important effect on bleaching process. Figure 1
shows the effect of pH of bleaching process on the lightness
of SeaCell
®
Active fabric. The process was carried out using
5 ml/l hydrogen peroxide at 90
o
C for 60 min. The colour
values of the raw and bleached SeaCell
®
Active fabrics are
given in Table 3. The given data indicates that the Lightness
value decreases slightly by raising the pH from 7.5 to 9
while the Lightness value of SA6 decreases significantly by
raising the pH 10. It is clear from the Table 3 that the
Table 1 . Recipe of bleaching procedure of SeaCell Active fabric
Dyeing recipe Unit Colour yield/
Dyeing process
Material (SeaCell Active) g 4
Liquor ratio 1:30
HO (35 %) ml/l5, 10, 15, 20, 30
Stabilizer (Prestogen) g/l1
Na CO g/l0.1
NaOH g/l1
Temperature C 60, 70, 80, 90
Time min 30, 45, 60
pH - 7.5, 8, 9, 10
Table 2 . Bleaching process of SeaCell Active fabric at different
conditions
Sample
code
Temperature
(C)
Time
(min)
HO
(ml/l)pH
SA1
90
30
5
7.5SA2 45
SA3
60
SA4 8
SA5 9
SA6 10
SA7
30
7.5
SA8 8
SA9 9
SA10 10
SA11 10
7.5
SA12 15
SA13 20
SA14 80
5SA15 70
SA16 60
Bleaching of SeaCell Active Fabric Fibers and Polymers 2016, Vol.17, No.8 1177
Whiteness Index of bleached fabrics decreases simultaneously as
the lightness of fabrics decreases. It can be said that the
increase in pH has a negative effect on the Whiteness Index
and Lightness value. Values of redness-greenness (a
*
) and
yellowness-blueness (b
*
) have not changed prominently
with increase of pH. However, significant change is
happened on L
*
values and the highest L
*
value is obtained
as 86.12 with SA3 at pH 7.5. It can be clearly seen from the
Table 3 that the L
*
, a
*
and b
*
values of bleached SeaCell
®
Active fabrics differ more significant than that of untreated
SeaCell
®
Active fabric. The most remarkable change can be
seen on L
*
value of untreated and SA6 fabrics. This could be
explained in terms of increase in pH. Because, alkali medium
activates hydrogen peroxide and H
+
ion is neutralized by
alkali for liberating of H
2
O (equation (3)). However, the
liberation of HOO
−
anion takes place very fast at high pH
values, therefore hydrogen peroxide becomes unstable with
the formation of oxygen gas which has no bleaching
property. If the decomposition rate is very high, the reaction
occurs between unutilized HOO
−
anions and unbleachable
species which leading to damage the fibre and lower L
*
[21].
It could be concluded from Figure 1 that pH 7.5 is the
optimum when the bleaching process is carried out using
this procedure.
H
2
O
2
(3)
The effect of pH of bleaching process on the lightness of
SeaCell
®
Active fabric was studied with 2 different hydrogen
peroxide concentrations (5 ml/l and 30 ml/l). In Figure 2, the
process was carried out using 30 ml/l hydrogen peroxide and
the other parameters maintained constant as is done in
Figure 1. Theincrease of hydrogen peroxide concentration
from 5 ml/l to 30 ml/l has effected the Lightness values in a
positive way. From Table 3, it can be seen that the samples
given in Figure 2 have better L
*
values than the samples
given in Figure 1. However, the Lightness value shows a
decreasing trend with the increase of pH from 7.5 to 10. The
significant effect of increased hydrogen peroxide concentration
can be seen in SA6 fabric. L
*
value of SA10 fabric has
increased dramatically with the increase of hydrogen peroxide
concentration. It can be clearly seen from the results that
SA7 fabric has the highest L
*
value. Moreover, the Whiteness
Index of the bleached fabric increases significantly as the
concentration of hydrogen peroxide increases. The maximum
value of whiteness index is obtained with SA7 fabric as
48.7. It could be concluded from the obtained data that the
optimum concentration of hydrogen peroxide which leads to
the highest Lightness value and acceptable Whiteness Index
is 30 ml/l. Also, it can be concluded form the Figure 2 that
the pH 7.5 gives better results than the others.
Effect of Process Temperature
The bleaching process was carried out at different
temperatures 60
o
C, 70
o
C, 80
o
C and 90
o
C using 5 ml/l of
hydrogen peroxide. According to the results obtained above,
the pH of the process was fixed to 7.5. The duration was set
to 60 min. Figure 3 shows the effect of process temperature
on the lightness of SeaCell
®
Active fabric. It is clear from
figure that increasing the process temperature from 60
o
C to
90
o
C is accompanied by increase in Lightness value and
improvement in the Whiteness Index. The noncellulosic
materials and the silver present in the structure of SeaCell
®
Active fibre is responsible for imparting dark colour to
fabric. When the process temperature was increased, the
oxidative reaction in removing of the noncellulosics takes
H
+
OOH
−
+
OH
H
2
O OOH
−
+
Figure 1. Effect of pH of bleaching process on the L value
(process temperature: 90 C, process duration: 60 min, H O
concentration: 5 ml/l).
Figure 2. Effect of pH of bleaching process on the L value
(process temperature: 90 C, process duration: 60 min, H O
concentration: 30 ml/l).
Figure 3. Effect of bleaching temperature on the L value (pH: 7.5,
process duration: 60 min, H O concentration: 5 ml/l).
1178 Fibers and Polymers 2016, Vol.17, No.8 B. Cenkkut Gültekin
place more effectively. Therefore, this behaviour improves
the Whiteness Index. Moreover, high temperature hydrogen
peroxide bleaching process leads to fast and complete
hydrogen peroxide decomposition to liberate the active
bleaching species. On the other hand, high temperature makes
cotton fabric more swollen and increases its accessibility,
thus, the diffusion of bleaching agent to the fabric rises [22,
23].
Effect of Process Duration
Figure 4 shows the effect of process duration on the
lightness of SeaCell
®
Active fabric. To investigate the effect
of bleaching time, the process was carried out at 90
o
C, pH
7.5 and 5 ml/l hydrogen peroxide concentration for 30, 45
and 60 minutes. It can be obviously seen that the Lightness
values of fabric increases significantly with the increase of
bleaching time from 30 to 60 min. The results indicate that
60 min is ideal to obtain effective bleaching performance.
However, the increase of bleaching time to 60 min at process
parameters given above is not enough to give acceptable
Whiteness Index.
Effect of Hydrogen Peroxide Concentration
Figure 5 shows the effect of hydrogen peroxide concentration
on the lightness of SeaCell
®
Active fabric. The bleaching
process was carried out at 90
o
C for 60 min, the pH was fixed
to 7.5 and hydrogen peroxide concentration was varied as 5,
10, 15, 20 and 30 ml/l. The results reveal that increasing
Figure 4. Effect of bleaching duration on the L value (process
tempetarure: 90 °C, pH: 7.5, H O concentration: 5 ml/l).
Table 3 . CIELab, Tristimulus and Whiteness Index Values of SeaCell Active fabrics
Codes of
processes
CIELab and Tristimulus values WI
La b C h XYX
SA 65.74 8.41 21.33 22.92 68.49 35.60 34.99 22.95 N/A
SA1 81.05 1.74 12.98 13.10 82.37 56.22 58.57 49.34 N/A
SA2 83.00 1.06 13.20 13.25 85.40 59.38 62.17 52.41 N/A
SA3 86.12 0.77 10.04 10.07 85.64 65.03 68.23 61.40 18.8
SA4 84.97 0.63 10.59 10.61 86.80 62.80 65.95 58.64 13.2
SA5 83.02 1.62 13.18 13.28 82.99 59.97 62.54 52.77 N/A
SA6 57.102.84 16.26 16.50 80.08 24.78 25.45 18.09 N/A
SA7 87.02 -0.09 4.36 4.36 91.20 66.37 70.05 69.78 48.7
SA8 86.45 -0.08 6.32 6.32 90.72 69.17 73.00 70.38 42.5
SA9 86.37 0.25 4.23 4.24 86.64 65.27 68.72 68.57 47.9
SA10 76.13 -0.17 6.68 6.68 91.50 47.43 50.09 47.26 13.6
SA11 83.78 0.66 11.79 11.81 86.80 60.62 63.65 55.21 4.3
SA12 84.58 0.21 9.56 9.57 88.77 61.89 65.18 59.01 17.3
SA13 85.64 -0.06 9.16 9.16 90.4 63.75 67.27 61.46 21.9
SA14 80.68 1.77 13.44 13.55 82.48 55.59 57.9048.29 N/A
SA15 77.43 2.67 15.04 15.27 79.93 50.52 52.24 41.79 N/A
SA16 73.99 3.60 16.59 16.98 77.76 45.51 46.69 35.69 N/A
N/A: Not applicable because of minus values.
Figure 5. Effect of hydrogen peroxide concentration on the L
value (process temperature: 90 C, process duration: 60 min, pH:
7.5).
Bleaching of SeaCell Active Fabric Fibers and Polymers 2016, Vol.17, No.8 1179
amount of hydrogen peroxide is accompanied by increase in
Whiteness Index and Lightness value. It is clearly seen from
Table 3 that the whiteness of fabrics increased slightly with
the increasing hydrogen peroxide concentration until 20 ml/l
and then increased sharply at 30 ml/l hydrogen peroxide
concentration. It is noteworthy to mention that low concen-
trations of hydrogen peroxide leads to little removal of
noncellulosics, thus the Whiteness Index is not satisfactory.
As the hydrogen peroxide concentration increased, the
amount of active bleaching species increased, so that the
Whiteness Index increased. It could be obviously seen from
Table 3 and Figure 5 that the highest Whiteness Index and
Lightness value was obtained at SA7 fabric as 48.7 and
87.02 respectively when the bleaching process is carried out
using the given parameters.
SEM Images
Figure 6 shows the SEM images of SeaCell
®
Active
fabrics before and after bleaching treatment; from this figure
it is possible to see the spherical silver particles. It can be
seen that the SeaCell
®
Active fibres are damaged after
bleaching treatment because of the chemical agents and
mechanical effects. Also, it can be clearly observed that the
silver ions seem to be remained after bleaching treatment.
Conclusion
Before bleaching, SeaCell
®
Active fabric appears to be
yellow for a
*
value and not to be lightness for L
*
value
65.74, and Whiteness Index value is not applicable due to
the minus values. SeaCell
®
Active fabric has more silver ion.
Thus, when it is exposed to the relative humidity of the air
and hydrogen sulphide in the air, it is not whiter colour.
After the bleaching treatment, the Tristimulus and Whiteness
Index values of the SeaCell
®
Active fabrics show that the
SA7 process (pH 7.5, 90
o
C, 60 min and 30 ml/l H
2
O
2
concentration) has been the best process in this study. It can
be said that especially pH value and H
2
O
2
concentration
have been important to reach better whiteness. The oxidizing
capacity of hydrogen peroxide is so strong; therefore active
oxygen is responsible for the bleaching action. It should be
noted that the bleaching effect of hydrogen peroxide differs
according to the hydrogen-ion concentration (pH). In this
study, when pH is at 7.5, the bleaching efficiency of hydrogen
peroxide on SeaCell
®
Active fabrics increases. It was seen
that the bleaching effect decreases when pH value increases.
In contrast, the bleaching effect increases while pH is getting
closer to 7. As a result, it is understood that silver is oxidized
when it is exposed to hydrogen peroxide at high pH value
through bleaching process.
In this study, optimum process parameters for hydrogen
peroxide bleaching of SeaCell
®
Active fabric were determined.
So, it can be concluded that, based on the results of the
study; pH of the process should be fixed to 7.5, process
temperature should be at 90
o
C, 60 min is ideal and 30 ml/l
H
2
O
2
concentration gives the effective bleaching performance.
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