UV-curable hyperbranched polyester acrylate encapsulation of phthalocyanine pigments for high performance synthetic fabrics printing

Abstract UV-curable hyperbranched polyester acrylate is formulated for encapsulation of phthalocyanine pigments using liquid-phase separation method. The encapsulated pigments were used as a UV-curable binder incorporated the pigment colours to eliminate the solid content, slow dry rate and hardness of conventional UV curable systems. Thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA), transmission electron microscope (TEM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), dynamic light scattering (DLS) and X-ray diffraction pattern (XRD) were examined in details. The characterization demonstrated the successful encapsulation of phthalocyanine pigments via UV-curable hyperbranched polyester acrylate. Thermal gravity analysis indicates that the encapsulated pigment films have better thermal stability than the pure pigments. The roughness and colour fastness to rubbing, washing, and light of the printed fabrics by encapsulated pigment, were compared to the same fabrics printed by conventional pigment printing using the UV curable formulation system with the linear counterpart of polyester acrylate as well as the conventional UV curable binder. The results showed that the printed samples with encapsulated pigment displayed the highest colour strength compared with the conventional printed samples. Additionally, the UV-curable hyperbranched polyester acrylate can be cured by short exposure to UV light and eliminate the surface roughness effect of UV curable system, decreased the solid content which increased the durability properties, rubbing and washing of printed fabrics.