No.6（2003）21.Opal finishing of textile fabrics using enzyme treatment

Yoshimitsu IKEDA, Kengo KOBAYASHI and Susumu SAITO

Dealing with inorganic salts before the enzyme treatment, we could shorten the processing time of opal finishing remarkably. We printed the cotton/rayon union cloth with paste which including sodium thiocyanate before being treated with the enzyme (cellulase) solution making it possible to carry out opal finish. Similarly we printed the silk/tussah silk union cloth with paste including calcium thiocyanate before being treated with the enzyme (protease) solution making it possible to carry out opal finish. These process do not use strong chemicals but we must be careful of decline in strength, and a deepening of shades. For practical purposes, weight loss by enzyme treatment is often decided by the property of the cloth. Some examples of these are mixture ratio, clothes density, twist number, fineness etc. So we should adapt strict conditions that are suitable for the properties of the cloth in question.

Keywords
Inorganic salts, Cellulase, Protease, Sodium thiocyanate, Calcium thiocyanate

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