Improvement of the adhesion of conductive poly(m-toluidine) onto chemically reduced-wool fabrics

Wool has disulphide bonds containing-hydrophobic external keratin layers, which act as a barrier for the modification through coating with hydrophilic materials. For that reason, in this work, to ensure a dense and homogenous conductive polymer coating onto the wool, the fabrics were subjected to the reduction process in the aqueous alkaline medium containing agents that can attack these disulphide bonds. Then, one of the polyaniline derivatives, poly(mtoluidine) (PMT), was coated onto wool by in situ polymerization of m-toluidine sulphate using ammonium persulfate (APS) as an oxidant.