Green technology for crosslinking protein molecules for various uses

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11019902-B2
Application number	US-201515307828-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	May 1, 2015
Priority date	May 1, 2014
Publication date	Jun 1, 2021
Grant date	Jun 1, 2021

Abstract

The present disclosure relates to, inter alia, a green technology for crosslinking protein molecules for various uses, where the protein molecules can be contained in protein fibers such as, but not limited to, human hair, animal fibers, and mixtures thereof. In one aspect, the present disclosure relates to a crosslinking agent comprising an oxidized sugar having at least two aldehyde groups. In another aspect, the present disclosure relates to a method of crosslinking protein fibers. This method involves providing the aforementioned crosslinking agent and infiltrating a plurality of non-crosslinked protein fibers with the crosslinking agent under conditions effective to cause protein molecules contained in the non-crosslinked protein fibers to become crosslinked, thereby yielding a population of crosslinked protein fibers.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method of crosslinking keratin-containing fibers of hair to maintain a desired three dimensional structure of the keratin-containing fibers of hair, said method comprising:
providing a crosslinking agent comprising an oxidized sugar having at least two aldehyde groups, wherein the sugar is selected from the group consisting of monosaccharides, disaccharides, trisaccharides, and tetrasaccharides; and
infiltrating a plurality of keratin-containing fibers of hair with the crosslinking agent under conditions effective to cause protein molecules contained in the keratin-containing fibers to become crosslinked, thereby yielding a population of crosslinked keratin-containing fibers,
wherein the protein molecules of the keratin-containing fibers comprise amine groups that react with the at least two aldehyde groups of the oxidized sugar to achieve the crosslinking of the protein molecules to yield the crosslinked keratin-containing fibers of hair.

2. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the crosslinking agent is an aqueous solution having at least 1-60 weight percent of the oxidized sugar.

3. The method according to claim 1 , wherein said infiltrating step is carried out at a temperature of less than 100° C., and for a length of time sufficient to yield the population of crosslinked keratin-containing fibers at said temperature used for carrying out the infiltrating step.

4. The method according to claim 3 further comprising:
heating the population of crosslinked keratin-containing fibers at a temperature of between about 100° C. and about 220° C. for a period of time of between about 3 seconds and about 120 seconds to substantially complete the crosslinking.

5. The method according to claim 4 , wherein the heating is carried out by applying a source of heat to the population of crosslinked keratin-containing fibers.

6. The method according to claim 5 , wherein the source of heat is selected from the group consisting of a flat iron, hot rollers, a hot plate, a curling iron, a hair dryer, an iron, a clothes dryer, and an oven.

7. The method according to claim 1 further comprising:
washing the population of crosslinked keratin-containing fibers to remove residual crosslinking agent or to remove crosslinking agent adhering to the keratin-containing fibers, thereby substantially removing the crosslinking agent.

8. The method according to claim 7 , wherein the washing is carried out using water or soap water.

9. The method according to claim 1 , wherein said infiltrating step is carried out at a pH of between about 7 and about 12.

10. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the hair comprises human hair, non-human hair, or a mixture thereof.

11. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the hair is selected from the group consisting of straight hair, wavy hair, and curly hair, or combinations thereof.

12. The method according to claim 10 , wherein the non-human hair comprises animal fibers selected from the group consisting of wool, alpaca, angora, fur, cashmere, mohair, and qiviut.

13. The method according to claim 12 , wherein the animal fibers are from animals selected from the group consisting of sheep, vicuna, alpaca, llama, muskox, goats, bison, camel, yak, horse, chinchilla, and rabbit.

14. The method according to claim 12 , wherein the animal fibers have a form selected from the group consisting of raw fibers, yarns, felts, and woven or knitted fabrics.

15. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the sugar is selected from the group consisting of galactose, sucrose, maltose, lactose, raffinose, and stachyose.

16. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the crosslinking agent is prepared according to a method comprising the steps of:
providing a mixture of non-oxidized sugar molecules; and
reacting the non-oxidized sugar molecules with an oxidizing agent to cause oxidation of the non-oxidized sugar molecules to yield a reaction mixture comprising oxidized sugar molecules having at least two aldehyde groups, said oxidized sugar molecules corresponding to the crosslinking agent.

17. The method according to claim 16 , wherein the oxidation is carried out at a temperature of less than 100° C.

18. The method according to claim 16 , wherein the oxidation is carried out at a pH of between about 2 and about 4.

19. The method according to claim 16 , wherein the oxidizing agent is hydrogen peroxide (H 2 O 2 ).

20. The method according to claim 19 , wherein the hydrogen peroxide (H 2 O 2 ) is acidified.

21. The method according to claim 16 further comprising:
introducing an enzyme to the reaction mixture to inhibit further oxidation of aldehyde groups of the oxidized sugar molecules to carboxyl groups.

22. The method according to claim 21 , wherein the enzyme is introduced at a point in the oxidation reaction so as to yield a mixture of oxidized sugar molecules having a greater concentration of aldehyde groups as compared to carboxyl group.

23. The method according to claim 21 further comprising:
removing residual amounts of the oxidizing agent after introducing the enzyme.

24. The method according to claim 21 , wherein the oxidizing agent is hydrogen peroxide (H 2 O 2 ) and the enzyme is effective to catalyze decomposition of the hydrogen peroxide into oxygen (O) and water (H 2 O).

25. The method according to claim 24 , wherein the enzyme is selected from the group consisting of catalase and peroxidase.

26. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the population of crosslinked keratin-containing fibers has an initial three dimensional (3D) structure.

27. The method according to claim 26 , wherein the population of crosslinked keratin-containing fibers are further treated to form a second 3D structure that is different from the initial 3D structure.

28. The method according to claim 27 , wherein the initial 3D structure and the second 3D structure are selected from the group consisting of a creased fabric, a non-creased fabric, a pleated fabric, straight hair, wavy hair, curly hair, and combinations of the straight, wavy, or curly hair.

29. The method according to claim 1 , wherein at least one of the aldehyde groups is oxidized from a primary hydroxyl group.

Assignees

• Univ Cornell

Inventors

• Netravali Anil
• Zhong Yidong

Classifications

• C08H1/02 Primary

  Protein-aldehyde condensates · CPC title

• A45D2/001

  Hair straightening appliances · CPC title

• A45D7/06 Primary

  combined chemical and thermal · CPC title

• C08H1/06

  derived from horn, hoofs, hair, skin or leather · CPC title

• D06M13/165

  Ethers (D06M13/11 takes precedence) · CPC title