TUNISIA – African researchers claim to have successfully dyed nylon fibres with pomegranate peel with good levels of dye exhaustion and dye durability. The scientists performed experiments at lab-scale and used soxhlet extraction and methanol to extract pigments from the waste part of the fruit, which is often discarded. The researchers then used high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) in order to demonstrate the presence of flavonoids such as luteolin, which dyed the fabrics with a yellow shade range. Other phenolic compounds were also also identified such as caffeic acid, a yellow solid which consists of both phenolic and acrylic functional groups.
