Silver speciation and release in commercial antimicrobial textiles as influenced by washing

[Display omitted] •The speciation of silver in commercial textiles, as revealed by XANES, is complex.•Silver nanoparticles are only one of several Ag species in commercial textiles.•Washing with two detergents resulted in significant changes in silver speciation.•The complexity of Ag speciation in t...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Chemosphere (Oxford) 2014-09, Vol.111, p.352-358
Main Authors: Lombi, Enzo, Donner, Erica, Scheckel, Kirk G., Sekine, Ryo, Lorenz, Christiane, Goetz, Natalie Von, Nowack, Bernd
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Analytical chemistry
Antiinfectives and antibacterials
Application fields
Applied sciences
Chemistry
Detergents
Detergents - chemistry
Exact sciences and technology
Labelling
Metal Nanoparticles - chemistry
Nanostructure
Polymer industry, paints, wood
Silver
Silver - analysis
Silver nanoparticles
Speciation
Spectrometric and optical methods
Technology of polymers
Textiles
Textiles - analysis
Washing
Water - chemistry
X-Ray Absorption Spectroscopy
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Summary:[Display omitted] •The speciation of silver in commercial textiles, as revealed by XANES, is complex.•Silver nanoparticles are only one of several Ag species in commercial textiles.•Washing with two detergents resulted in significant changes in silver speciation.•The complexity of Ag speciation in textiles complicates exposure assessment. The use of nanoscale Ag in textiles is one the most often mentioned uses of nano-Ag. It has previously been shown that significant amounts of the Ag in the textiles are released upon washing. However, the form of Ag present in the textiles remains largely unknown as product labelling is insufficient. The aim of this study was therefore to investigate the solid phase speciation of Ag in original and washed silver textiles using XANES. The original Ag speciation in the textiles was found to vary greatly between different materials with Ag(0), AgCl, Ag2S, Ag–phosphate, ionic Ag and other species identified. Furthermore, within the same textile a number of different species were found to coexist. This is likely due to a combination of factors such as the synthesis processes at industrial scale and the possible reaction of Ag with atmospheric gases. Washing with two different detergents resulted in marked changes in Ag-speciation. For some textiles the two detergents induced similar transformation, in other textiles they resulted in very different Ag species. This study demonstrates that in functional Ag textiles a variety of different Ag species coexist before and after washing. These results have important implications for the risk assessment of Ag textiles because they show that the metallic Ag is only one of the many silver species that need to be considered.
ISSN:0045-6535
1879-1298
DOI:10.1016/j.chemosphere.2014.03.116