Green fabrication of inkjet printed antibacterial wool fabric with natural gardenia yellow dye

The application of chemical synthetic dyes causes serious environmental pollution and high energy consumption. Natural plant dyes have become the most promising alternative in textile printing and dyeing processing with lower carbon emission. In this work, the properties of water-soluble gardenia yellow natural dye in inkjet printing of wool fabrics were studied in detail. The results of multiple light scattering showed that the gardenia yellow dye ink had high stability. The surface tension and viscosity of the ink can be adjusted by polyol-based organic solvents to obtain a stable droplet morphology. The influence mechanism of sodium polyacrylate sizing agent and polyol solvent on color depth and contour clarity of printing pattern have been deeply studied. After tannic treatment, gardenia yellow inkjet printed wool fabric can obtain satisfactory color fastness. At the same time, gardenia yellow dye endowed wool fabrics with good antibacterial property, and the antibacterial rate against S. aureus and E. coli can exceed 95%. In this study, both inkjet printing and color fixing process are green and non-pollution, which provides an idea reference for the production of natural green antibacterial textiles.