Antibacterial and acid and cationic dyeable bamboo cellulose (rayon) fabric on grafting

► Enhanced grafting using mixture of acrylic acid and polyacrylamide. ► Improvement in moisture regain of fabric on grafting. ► Improved dyeability towards both acid and cationic dyes. ► Immobilization of silver nanoparticles on swollen grafted fabrics. ► Durable antibacterial activity of nanoparticles containing grafted fabrics. Bamboo is considered to be important biopolymer with useful applications in various fields including textiles. In the current study bamboo rayon fabric was grafted with a mixture of acrylic acid and acrylamide using potassium persulfate (KPS) as an initiator. The graft copolymerization parameters were optimized in terms of acrylic acid to acrylamide ratio, temperature, time, initiator concentration and monomer concentration. The grafted product was characterized using FTIR, TGA and SEM and further evaluated for properties like moisture regain and yellowness index. The ungrafted and grafted fabrics were then dyed using cationic and acid dyes. The grafted material showed improved dyeability towards both acid and cationic dyes with improvement in fastness properties. Ag+ ions adsorbed on grafted fabric, through treatment with AgNO3, were reduced into Ag(0) nanoparticles. Such fabric showed excellent antibacterial properties against both gram positive and gram-negative bacteria with durability of 50 washes.