Optimisation of process conditions of cotton fabric treatment with<i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal"> Terminalia chebula </i>extract for antibacterial application

Abstract

The methanol extracts of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">Terminalia chebula </i>fruits as antibacterial agent and citric acid as a crosslinking agent have been applied on cotton plain woven fabric and the treated fabrics are then tested for antibacterial activity against bacterial strains like <i>Staphylococcus aureus </i><span style="mso-bidi-font-style:italic">and<i> Escherichia coli, </i>under agar diffusion test and quantitative assessment.<span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold"> The results indicate that the treated cotton fabric shows a clear antibacterial activity with 27-38 mm zone of inhibition in the agar diffusion test against the above-mentioned strains. The treated samples show 93.33% of reduction against <i>Staphylococcus aureus </i><span style="mso-bidi-font-style:italic">and 82.14 % reduction against<i> Escherichia coli</i> as per quantitative assessment. the antibacterial finished textile samples have also been evaluated for the physical properties like tensile strength, tearing strength, water absorbency and air permeability. process parameters are optimized for better performance of antibacterial treated material by the response surface methodology adopted using Box – behnken design and the regression equations have been obtained for fabric properties. The optimized process parameters for higher antibacterial ability of the treated textile material with optimum physical properties are extract concentration of 25%, crosslinking agent of 7.5% and the curing temperature of 94.16⁰C.

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