Self-Cleaning Cotton Obtained after Grafting Thermoresponsive Poly(N-vinylcaprolactam) through Surface-Initiated Atom Transfer Radical Polymerization

Although the performance of smart textiles would be enhanced if they could display self-cleaning ability toward various kinds of contamination, the procedures that have been used previously to impart the self-cleaning potential to these functional fabrics (solvent casting, dip coating, spin coating, surface crosslinking) have typically been expensive and/or limited by uncontrollable polymer thicknesses and morphologies. In this paper, we demonstrate the use of atomic transfer radical polymerization for the surface-initiated grafting of poly(N-vinylcaprolactam), a thermoresponsive polymer, onto cotton. We confirmed the thermoresponsiveness and reusability of the resulting fabric through water contact angle measurements and various surface characterization techniques (scanning electron microscopy, atomic force microscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy). Finally, we validated the self-cleaning performance of the fabric by washing away an immobilized fluorescent protein in deionized water under thermal stimulus. Fluorescence micrographs revealed that, after the fifth wash cycle, the fabric surface had undergone efficient self-cleaning of the stain, making it an effective self-cleaning material. This approach appears to have potential for application in the fields of smart textiles, responsive substrates, and functional fabrics.