Fabrication, Characterization and Tanning Performances Investigation of a Novel Epoxide

Abstract

A novel epoxide (IEGA) is synthesized using isophorone diamine(IPDA) and epichlorohydrin (ECH) as starting materials. Thestructure of IEGA is characterized by Fourier transform infrared(FT-IR) and 1H nuclear magnetic resonance (1H NMR). Thetanning performance of IEGA is tested in ethanol from theaspects of the IEGA dosage, tanning temperature, pH value, andtanning time on shrinkage temperature (Ts) of sheep skin. It isfound that under the optimized conditions with IEGA, the Ts ofsheep skin tanned with IEGA is about 86°C, which is higherthan normal epoxide tanned leather. Furthermore, SEM showedthat IEGA tanned leather obtained better opened-up fiberstructure than glycerol triglycidyl ether (GTE) tanned leather.Tanning mechanism investigation suggested that the crosslinkingprocess should be predominately taking place among the-NH2 groups of collagen fibers by the epoxy groups of IEGA.