Antibacterial performance of Tencel fabric dyed with pomegranate peel extracted via ultrasonic method

Application of naturally dyed fabrics is increasing due to the biological protection, pollution control, ecology and improved quality of life of human beings. Antimicrobial textiles can be the best choice to avoid fabric related infection. Many plants have been regarded as suitable for extraction of natural dyes that can also show good antibacterial activity. However, in this work, natural dye from pomegranate peel was extracted by ultrasonic method and then lyocell fabrics were treated with different mordanting agents. Afterwards, mordanted fabric samples were dyed by exhaust dyeing. Dyed samples were analyzed with rubbing, washing, perspiration and light exposure tests for color fastness. The results revealed that different types of mordants have dissimilar effects on color efficiency and color range values of dyed lyocell fabrics. The dyed fabric with different mordants showed excellent color strength (K/S) values (6.4) and color fastness properties of washing (4–5), light (5–6), rubbing (4–5) and perspiration (4–5). Furthermore, FTIR confirmed that no structural change occurred in the lyocell fabric before and after the dyeing process. Additionally, antimicrobial properties of un-dyed and dyed with pomegranate peel were assessed against Staphylococcus aureus (ATCC® 25923™) by the agar diffusion test method. The obtained antimicrobial activities of the samples dyed with pomegranate peel were compared with that of the un-dyed samples. The un-dyed samples displayed slight antibacterial properties while fabrics dyed with pomegranate peel exhibited suitable antibacterial properties. Thus, lyocell fabrics dyed with pomegranate peel are useful for biomedical applications.