Improving hygiene performance of microfiber synthetic leather base by mixing polyhydroxybutyrate nanofiber

Compared with natural leather, microfiber synthetic leather has many excellent properties such as chemical resistance and physical and mechanical properties. However, the preparation of high performance microfiber synthetic leather with excellent water vapor transmission rate, moisture absorption, and wearing comfort property still has a great challenge. The aim of this work was to improve moisture absorbent and transfer abilities by mixing polyhydroxybutyrate hydrophilic nanofibers in microfiber synthetic leather base. The effect of polyhydroxybutyrate nanofibers content on the structure and properties of microfiber synthetic leather base were investigated. The results indicated that polyhydroxybutyrate nanofibers with an average diameter of 0.40 μm were evenly distributed in all directions of microfiber synthetic leather base. As the nanofibers content increased from 0% to 20%, water contact angle decreased from 111.64° to 59.31°, resulting in 44% increase in water vapor transmission rate (from 3112.37 g/(m 2 24 h) to 4350.53 g/(m 2 24 h)) and 22.3% increase in moisture absorption (from 649.12% to 812.92%). Meanwhile, the addition of nanofibers made microfiber synthetic leather base dense, leading to 24.0% decrease in air permeability. In particular, the softness of microfiber synthetic leather base was increased by 42.18%. In addition, the tear strength was also significantly enhanced. Therefore, this study provided a viable method for preparing high performance microfiber synthetic leather base to use polyhydroxybutyrate nanofibers.