US20130122294A1

US20130122294A1 - Fiber for artificial hair with antibacterial and antifungal properties and methods of preparing the same

Info

Publication number: US20130122294A1
Application number: US13/351,505
Authority: US
Inventors: Sang Soon Han
Original assignee: Selim Fiber Co Ltd
Current assignee: Selim Fiber Co Ltd
Priority date: 2011-11-16
Filing date: 2012-01-17
Publication date: 2013-05-16
Also published as: KR101241395B1

Abstract

Disclosed are fibers for the manufacture of artificial hair with a core/sheath structure which include antibacterial and antifungal nanoparticles in the sheath structure, thus providing antibacterial and antifungal properties which can last for a considerable period of time. The sheath structure of the fibers is formed to take about 20 to about 30% of the diameter of the fibers so that the fibers can retain desirable antibacterial and antifungal effects, thereby resolving problems of truncation of the fibers due to an increase of pressure in a spinning machine during a spinning process.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application claims priority to and the benefit of Korean Patent Application No. 2011-0119684, filed on Nov. 16, 2011, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.

BACKGROUND

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a fiber for artificial hair with antibacterial and antifungal properties and methods of preparing the same. In particular, the fiber for artificial hair of the present invention has a sheath/core composite structure.
2. Discussion of Related Art
With an improvement in living standards, it has become more popular for people to wear artificial hair for styling purposes. Artificial hair, being either implanted onto the scalp or pressed down and worn thereon, is susceptible to environmental contamination from dust and impurities due to sweat and heat generated by the human body or contamination from bacteria, mold, etc., which can have a harmful effect on the hygiene and health of the user. Therefore, it is essential that artificial hair be manufactured to have antibacterial and antifungal properties.
Recently, in the midst of introduction of various antibacterial hair materials, fibers for artificial hair having antibacterial and antifungal properties (Korean Patent Application Publication No. 10-2007-0050147) have been developed and manufactured.
However, these artificial hair fibers formed of antibacterial materials have a few disadvantages. First, the artificial hair fibers have not had a sufficient duration of antibacterial and antifungal properties which soon diminished rapidly from the fibers after a few rinses. In addition, the level of antibacterial and antifungal properties has not been uniformly retained in each set of artificial hair but differed considerably from hair to hair thus showing no antibacterial and antifungal effect at all in some extreme cases.
Further, antibacterial material generally includes an inorganic substance which may be accumulated inside a spinning machine, thereby increasing the pressure therein, and it often causes truncation of the fibers.
Therefore, there has been a long felt need for the development of a fiber for artificial hair which can keep long-lasting antibacterial and antifungal properties therein. Also, it is important to prevent problems such as truncation of fibers during spinning of the fibers due to antibacterial and antifungal components.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention is directed to a fiber for artificial hair with antibacterial and antifungal properties which can be uniformly retained therein and also last for a considerable period of time.
Also, the present invention is directed to a method of manufacturing a fiber for artificial hair which can resolve existing problems which may occur during the use of a spinning machine using materials with an antibacterial property.
According to an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a fiber for artificial hair including: a core structure spun from at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyolefin, polyester, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide and polyacrylonitrile, and a sheath structure formed of a composition to encompass the surface of the core structure, wherein the composition includes at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyolefin, polyester, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide and polyacrylonitrile, and 0.05 to 5.0 parts by weight of nanoparticles, the surface of which is protected by sulfur compounds, with respect to 100 parts by weight of the resin.
In an exemplary embodiment, the nanoparticles may be manufactured by reduction of metal compounds in the presence of sulfur compounds.
In another exemplary embodiment, the nanoparticles are in the form of reductive precipitation on the matrix of at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyolefin, polyester, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide and polyacrylonitrile.
In a further exemplary embodiment, the sheath structure is formed in the range of about 10% to about 60% of the diameter of the fiber.
According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a method of manufacturing fibers for artificial hair including: adding at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyolefin, polyester, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide and polyacrylonitrile as a core component, and 0.05 to 5.0 parts by weight of nanoparticles with respect to 100 parts by weight of the resin of the core component or other kind of resin as a sheath component into a composite spinning machine; and melt-spinning at 200-290° C. and cooling the resultant composition.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The above and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become more apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art by describing in detail exemplary embodiments thereof with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:

FIG. 1 is a structural drawing of a fiber for artificial hair according to an embodiment of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EXEMPLARY EMBODIMENTS

Exemplary embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings. While the present invention is shown and described in connection with exemplary embodiments thereof, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications can be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.
The present invention relates to a fiber for artificial hair with a sheath/core type structure manufactured by incorporating nanoparticles having antibacterial and antifungal effects.
The above nanoparticles are metal nanoparticles whose surfaces are protected by sulfur compounds. These nanoparticles can be manufactured by reduction of metal compounds in the presence of sulfur compounds.
In an exemplary embodiment, the nanoparticles to be used may be prepared by reducing zinc compounds such as zinc chloride, zinc nitrate, zinc acetate, zinc sulfate and zinc hydroxide in the presence of sulfur compounds such as mercaptoacetic acid, mercaptopropionic acid, thiodipropionic acid, mercaptosuccinic acid, mercaptoethanol, thiodiethylene glycol, aminoethyl mercaptan, thiodiethyl amine, thiourethaene, thiocarbonic acid, thiourea, thiophenol, thioformamide, methyl mercaptan, isopropyl mercaptan, n-butyl mercaptan, allyl mercaptan, benzyl mercaptan, and salts and derivatives thereof.
Reducing agents to be used in the above reduction may include alkanol amines such as monoalkanol amine, dialkanol amine, and trialkanol amine; ethylene triamine, m-hexylamine, tetramethylene diamine, pentamethylene diamine, hexamethylene diamine, heptamethylene diamine, dimethylamine, triethanol amine, hydroxylamine sulfate, EDTA salt, ethylenediamine, diethyltriamine, triethylenetetramine, tetraethylenepentamine, and pentaethylenehexamine.
The surfaces of metal particles of the above nanoparticles are completely protected by sulfur compounds and therefore the incorporation of the nanoparticles into the sheath structure of the fibers for artificial hair can provide excellent antibacterial and antifungal effects.
In an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, the nanoparticles with antibacterial and antifungal properties may be prepared by reducing colloidal metal particles in the presence of sulfur compounds. However, the nanoparticles to be used in the present invention are not limited thereto, but can include anything as long as their surfaces are coated with sulfur compounds.
In particular, the nanoparticles incorporated in the sheath structure of the fibers for artificial hair of the present invention remain in the form of reductive precipitation on the matrix of at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyolefin, polyester, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide and polyacrylonitrile. That is, they are manufactured by mixing and stirring the nanoparticles added during the master batch process of the resin.
The nanoparticles incorporated into the master batch of the resin are diffused and transported to be released onto the surface of the resin, thereby being exposed to an environment to contact with bacteria and fungi. Accordingly, the artificial hair fiber prepared according to the present invention is provided with excellent antibacterial and antifungal activities and also with a long lasting effect.
As shown in FIG. 1, the artificial hair fiber prepared according to the present invention is prepared by a core structure spun from at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyolefin, polyester, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide and polyacrylonitrile, and a sheath structure to encompass the surface of the core structure, wherein the sheath structure is formed of a resin composition including the nanoparticles. In an embodiment of the present invention, the resin to be used in forming the sheath and core structures of the fiber for artificial hair may be the same as or different from each other.
In the present invention, a conventional composite spinning process is employed for the manufacture of fibers with a sheath/core structure. For the composite spinning, the resin with a sheath structure and that with a core structure are respectively added into a composite spinning machine and then subjected to melt-spinning, thereby manufacturing the fibers with the sheath/core structure. In the present invention, the core structure is spun using a conventional type of resin used for artificial hair, and nanoparticles with antibacterial and antifungal properties are incorporated only into the sheath structure, which is to encompass the core structure, thereby exhibiting excellent antibacterial and antifungal properties. The nanoparticles used are relatively small, being in the range of 0.05 to 5.0 parts by weight with respect to 100 parts by weight of resin used for forming the sheath structure. Therefore, it can prevent truncation of fibers often caused by an increase in the pressure of the spinning machine due to a large amount of antibacterial and antifungal components during a spinning process.
In an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, the sheath structure in the sheath/core structure of the fiber is formed to take about 10 to about 60% of the fiber diameter, preferably about 20 to about 30%. The nanoparticles of the present invention are provided with a protective film of sulfur compounds on their surface and thus can have excellent antibacterial and antifungal properties. Further, these antibacterial and antifungal properties can last a sufficiently long period of time showing superiority over the conventional ones. Therefore, in even a sheath structure which thinly covers the surface of the core structure, a sufficient antibacterial and antifungal effect can be provided.
In an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, the fibers for artificial hair may be manufactured by adding at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyolefin, polyester, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide and polyacrylonitrile as a core component, and 0.05 to 5.0 parts by weight of nanoparticles with respect to 100 parts by weight of the resin of the core component or other kind of resin as a sheath component into a composite spinning machine; and melt-spinning at 200 to 290° C. and cooling the resultant composition. The strength and elongation of thus obtained fibers can be improved by a selective drawing process. The drawing process may include heat drawing or steam drawing depending on the kind of resin used.
After the drawing process, the fibers can go through heat treatment to finally obtain the desirable fibers for artificial hair.
The present invention will be described in further detail through the following Examples but is not limited thereto.

Example 1

Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) resin with an intrinsic viscosity of 0.64 was dried and melted at 280° C. using a conventional melting extruder and spun via a spinneret. Here, a sheath part and a core part of the fibers were formed using two melting extruders via a sheath/core composite spinning method which enables the respective sheath and core parts to be formed. After completion of fiber formation, a discharge rate was determined so that the ratio of diameter of the sheath part and the core part became 3:7. Further, for the PET resin, 0.5 wt % of zinc sulfide antibacterial agent (AIZN Co., Ltd., Korea) was added to the sheath part of the resin. The fibers spun in the form of sheath/core type underwent the conventional elongation and heat treatment processes and then rolled up as fibers for artificial hair. Physical properties such as strength and elongation of the manufactured fibers were measured and their antibacterial properties were also measured after making them into circular knit fabric. Workability of the fibers was evaluated over a long period of spinning work.

Example 2

Spinning was performed at 230° C. using the same melt extruder as in Example 1 and using PET resin (Dae Han Chemical Co., Ltd., Korea). Sheath/core composite spinning was performed the same as in Example 1, wherein 0.05 wt % of zinc sulfide antibacterial agent (AIZN Co., Ltd., Korea) was added to the sheath part of the resin, and the ratio of diameter of the sheath part and the core part was set at 2:8. After spinning and elongation, the resultant composition was manufactured into fibers with suitable fineness for the use of artificial hair. Physical properties such as strength and elongation of the thus manufactured fibers were measured and their antibacterial properties were also measured after making them into circular knit fabric. Workability of the fibers was evaluated over a long period of spinning work.

Comparative Example 1

PET resin with an intrinsic viscosity of 0.64 was dried and melted at 280° C. using a conventional melting extruder and spun via a spinneret. 0.5 wt % of zinc sulfide antibacterial agent (AIZN Co., Ltd., Korea) was added to the PET resin with respect to the total amount of resin. The fibers spun in the form of sheath/core type underwent the conventional elongation and heat treatment processes and then rolled up as fibers for artificial hair. Physical properties such as strength and elongation of the thus manufactured fibers were measured and their antibacterial properties were also measured after making them into circular knit fabric. Workability of the fibers was evaluated over a long period of spinning work.

Comparative Example 2

PET resin with an intrinsic viscosity of 0.64 was dried and melted at 280° C. using a conventional melting extruder and spun via a spinneret. 0.01 wt % of zinc sulfide antibacterial agent (AIZN Co., Ltd., Korea) was added to the PET resin with respect to the total amount of resin. The fibers spun in the form of sheath/core type underwent the conventional elongation and heat treatment processes and then rolled up as fibers for artificial hair. Physical properties such as strength and elongation of the thus manufactured fibers were measured and their antibacterial properties were also measured after making them into circular knit fabric. Workability of the fibers was evaluated over a long period of spinning work.

Comparative Example 3

Commercialized polypropylene fiber for artificial hair (Selim Fiber Co., Ltd., Korea) was used for the purpose of comparison.

Comparative Example 4

Commercial PET for artificial hair (anonymous artificial hair fiber manufacturing company, Korea) was used for the purpose of comparison.
Physical properties such as fineness, strength, elongation, antibiosis and workability of the above fibers in Examples and Comparative Examples were measured.
Measurement of Physical Properties and their Evaluation
<Fineness, Strength, Elongation>
Fineness, strength, and elongation were measured according to KS Standard and evaluated therefrom.
<Workability>
Workability of fibers was evaluated by measuring the number of truncation based on 24 hour on-site production.
Excellent (⊚): less than 3 times
Average (◯): 3-10 times
Poor (X): 11 times or more
<Antibacterial Properties>
Antibacterial properties were evaluated for the fibers obtained in the above Examples and Comparative Examples according to JIS L 1902 with reference to E. coli ATCC 8739. The bacterial culture for test was placed under stationary culture for 24 hrs at 35±1° C. and RH 90±5% and then its antibacterial rate was calculated based on the bacterial count.
The results are shown in Table 1 below.

TABLE 1

			Comp.	Comp.	Comp.	Comp.
Category	Ex. 1	Ex. 2	Ex. 1	Ex. 2	Ex. 3	Ex. 4

Fineness (de)	52	58	54	55	60	62
Strength (g/d)	4.5	4.2	4.5	3.9	4.3	3.8
Elongation (%)	34	38	38	42	39	43
Workability	⊚	⊚	X	Δ	—	—
Antibacterial	99.9	99.9	93.5	73.6	23.4	32.6
Rate (%)

From the above Table, it was confirmed that the fibers for artificial hair of the present invention exhibited superiority in workability and antibacterial properties to those in the Comparative Examples while showing similar physical properties to those in the Comparative Examples in terms of fineness, strength, and elongation.
In particular, the fibers of the present invention showed a considerable improvement in workability over those in Comparative Examples 1 and 2, where the entire fibers included the antibacterial component. In addition, between the fibers in Example 1 and those in Comparative Example 1, where the antibacterial component was added at an equal rate, the antibacterial rate was higher in Example 1 than that in Comparative Example 1. From the foregoing, it can be concluded that the antibacterial properties depend on the components of the fiber surface. Accordingly, it is apparent that the present invention provides artificial hair fibers with an excellent antibacterial effect and with improved workability by spinning excellent antibacterial and antifungal components onto the surface of fibers.
As described above, the present invention provides a fiber for artificial hair with superior antibacterial and antifungal properties with lasting effects by incorporating nanoparticles having antibacterial and antifungal effects.
Further, the present invention can resolve the problems existing in the conventional fibers such as truncation of fibers due to an increase in pressure within a spinning machine by minimizing the amount of the above functional components during spinning of fibers with antibacterial and antifungal components.
It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications can be made to the above-described exemplary embodiments of the present invention without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention. Thus, it is intended that the present invention covers all such modifications provided they come within the scope of the appended claims and their equivalents.

Claims

What is claimed is:

1. A fiber for artificial hair comprising:

a core structure spun from at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyolefin, polyester, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide and polyacrylonitrile, and

a sheath structure formed of a composition to encompass the surface of the core structure,

wherein the composition comprises at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyolefin, polyester, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide and polyacrylonitrile, and 0.05 to 5.0 parts by weight of nanoparticles, the surface of which is protected by sulfur compounds, with respect to 100 parts by weight of the resin.

2. The fiber for artificial hair of claim 1, wherein the nanoparticles are manufactured in the presence of sulfur compounds by reducing metal compounds.

3. The fiber for artificial hair of claim 1, wherein the nanoparticles are in a form of reductive precipitation on a matrix of at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyolefin, polyester, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide and polyacrylonitrile.

4. The fiber for artificial hair of claim 1, wherein the sheath structure is formed in a range of about 10% to about 60% of a diameter of the fiber.

5. A method of manufacturing fibers for artificial hair, comprising:

adding at least one resin selected from the group consisting of polyolefin, polyester, polyvinyl chloride, polyamide and polyacrylonitrile as a core component, and 0.05 to 5.0 parts by weight of nanoparticles with respect to 100 parts by weight of the resin of the core component or other kind of resin as a sheath component into a composite spinning machine; and

melt-spinning at 200 to 290° C. and cooling the resultant composition.