Antibacterial and Antifouling Biobased Waterborne Polyurethane Prepared from Amphiphilic Plant Oil-Based Polyols

Developing plant oil-based waterborne polyurethane (WBPU) materials with both antibacterial and antifouling properties remains a great challenge. In this study, a range of amphiphilic soybean oil-based polyols were successfully synthesized by grafting poly(ethylene glycol) monomethyl ether (mPEG) onto the long fatty acid chains of epoxidized soybean oil (ESO) through a ring-opening reaction. Subsequently, the obtained polyols were utilized to prepare cationic WBPU dispersions. The results demonstrated that the biobased WBPU dispersions prepared from amphiphilic soybean oil-based polyols exhibited excellent stability compared to those prepared from traditional hydrophobic soybean oil-based polyols. In addition, the introduction of mPEG side chains enhanced the phase mixing of the soft segments in the WBPU network, resulting in a remarkable increase in the elongation at the break of the resulting WBPU films, which reached up to 745%. Furthermore, the soybean oil-based WBPU films containing mPEG side chains exhibited enhanced antibacterial and antifouling properties. Specifically, the amount of protein adhesion in the resulting WBPU films could be reduced by approximately 60%. The antibacterial rate against Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) was increased from 79.4% to 91.8%, while the rate against Escherichia coli (E. coli) increased from 78.2% to 92.3%. The resulting plant oil-based WBPU, with its excellent antibacterial and antifouling properties, holds promise for various medical and healthcare applications, including antibacterial wound dressings.