Sustainable and efficient strategy for functional Lyocell fiber manufacture through curcumin-loaded nanospheres

Lyocell fiber is an important choice for functional apparel textiles because of its advantages of comfort, high strength, sustainable source and pollution-free spinning process. However, current methods for functionalization Lyocell fibers, such as blend spinning or surface modification using inorganic and synthetic materials, are generally complex, less environmentally friendly and easy to lose functionality. In this study, for the first time, we innovatively loaded the natural functional material curcumin into cationic polymer nanospheres and applied them in Lyocell fiber functionality through a simple one-step dyeing process. The fabricated curcumin@polymer nanospheres had a uniform particle distribution of approximately 148.03 nm, and exhibited a positive surface potential of +25.3 mV. Under the action of cationic polymer nanospheres, the interaction between curcumin and Lyocell fiber was obviously enhanced, and the mechanism was analyzed. The colored fibers possessed high antibacterial efficacy of 99.99 % against Staphylococcus aureus due to the synergistic antibacterial activity of curcumin and the quaternary ammonium salt groups in polymer sturcture. Furthermore, the application of the prepared curcumin@polymer nanospheres could realize the one-step process for coloration and functionalization of Lyocell fibers. Therefore, from the measurement of antibacterial activity, stability, and coloration depth, curcumin@PMBD showed great potential in the manufacture of greener antibacterial textile.