Medical Textile Coated by Photocatalytic Titanium Dioxide Nanoparticles for Self-Cleaning Ability

Medical textile is derived from natural cotton fibers that are known as soft, friendly, comfortable, and easy to use. The process of applying semiconductor oxide nanoparticles with photocatalytic activity on the medical fabric surface will release reactive oxygen species (ROS) under light irradiation, which can remove bacteria, dirt, and stains. The TiO
2
nanoparticles were successfully synthesized via the sol-gel method, after that TiO
2
nanoparticles were coated over the medical fabric and evaluated the physicochemical characteristics based on XRD, SEM, EDS, UV-vis methods, contact angle, strength tensile, elongation tensile, and breathability. The distribution of TiO
2
on the medical fabric surface was shown by the SEM-EDS method. Photocatalytic activity of TiO
2
achieves 98.35% efficiency in 9.5 h for azo dye MB (MB concentration in distilled water is 10 ppm) and 36.4% for red grape wine (the alcohol concentration in distilled water is 5% by volume). After 12 h of UV irradiation, the photocatalytic degradation of the pigment in red wine by photocatalysis resulted in observable decoloration, but the stain did not completely disappear on the medical textile. The TiO
2
nanoparticles showed high photocatalytic activity. The impregnation method used to apply TiO
2
nanoparticles to the medical fabric is an easy-to-implement method that can be deployed in the industry. This method can create fabrics that resist and decompose stains under ultraviolet light.