Recent advances in the application of chitosan nanoparticles for the modification of textiles

The textile industry constantly demands innovative products, including developing functional textiles that can be produced by several finishing processes, maintaining the desired qualities of the fabric, and modifying the undesired ones. Methodologies applying chitosan nanoparticles (ChiNps) on the fiber are attracting much interest. Chitosan is a renewable, biocompatible, and biodegradable polysaccharide capable of providing antimicrobial activity to textiles. Besides that, ChiNps can improve dyeing processes and fabric resistance and confer other features, such as flame-retardant capacity and UV protection. Despite the importance of textile modification using ChiNps, the literature needs a review focused on chemical interactions and methods, crossing information with properties and durability. This review presents the main techniques used to prepare ChiNps for further application on textiles. It focuses on the recent advances and perspectives of the publications of the last five to six years concerning the general application of ChiNps to the surface of textiles. The publications are organized by the type of ChiNps interaction with the fabric, including intermolecular interaction or covalent bonds and research combining ChiNps with metallic nanoparticles. Most studies use ionic cross-linking to form ChiNps, a more straightforward methodology. Furthermore, ChiNps are incorporated into the surface of fabrics, primarily using intermolecular interactions. For this reason, pure synthetic fabrics, which are less polar, are much less precisely used with ChiNps. However, some promising reactions might overcome these inconveniences, including covalent bonds or the association of ChiNps and metal or metal oxide nanoparticles.