Application of Chinese herbal medicine onto cotton fabric by dyeing methods

In this study, a traditional Chinese herbal medicine—PentaHerbs formula (PHF), usually used for the treatment of atopic dermatitis, was successfully coated onto cotton fabrics by means of dyeing methods, i.e., mordant dyeing and direct dyeing process. Alum, copper sulphate and calcium chloride were used as mordant agents, and the mordanting processes adopted were pre-mordanting and post-mordanting process. The coated cotton fabrics with herbal medicine were mainly analyzed in terms of colour strength (K/S value) and drug loading using spectrophotometric analysis. Besides, the change of weight of the coated fabrics was also measured via gravimetric method. It was found that the mordanting process could significantly improve the drug loading, especially for the pre-mordanting process, compared with the direct dyeing method. Among the three mordants, alum treated fabrics had the highest drug loading. The results indicate that mordant dyeing process might be a promising way to develop herbal medicine garments.