Studies on the development of polymeric composite syntans for leather retanning application

Abstract

The art of leather making has evolved from being a greener process in the early times using natural sources to a wide range of chemical involved process that is not being considered as sustainable in the recent times due to its lower binding affinity resulting in poor exhaustion and emission of toxic chemicals on ageing Value addition to the tanned leather has been a major parameter where large combination of chemicals involving phenols and formaldehydes are being used In order to eradicate enormous commercially used chemicals it is highly important to replace them with materials that does tune in with the environment as well as provide multifunctional properties such as even filling of leather matrix grain tightness and belly filling properties Herein we report the synthesis and characterization of a polymeric syntans containing hydroxyapatite glycolic acid and lactic acid as starting materials These tailored polymeric syntans has been used as a retanning agent in the post tanning process of leather making Hydroxyapatite HA was synthesized through chemical precipitation and characterised for its average particle size through Dynamic Light Scattering DLS and morphology through Scanning Electron Microscopy SEM confirmation of its crystallinity through X ray Diffraction XRD and spectral analysis through Fourier Transform Infrared Analysis FTIR was carried out newline