Intumescent flame‐retardant and ultraviolet‐blocking coating screen‐printed on cotton fabric

Herein, we report an interlayer-confined strategy to intercalating two-dimensional zirconium phosphate (ZrP) within reduced graphene oxide (RGO) interlayers, generating the hierarchical ZrP–RGO hybrids. The hybrids were then blended with ammonium polyphosphate to fabricate an intumescent flame-retardant coating on cotton fabric through an automatic screen printing. The resulting cotton fabric shows an excellent self-extinguishing performance when subjected to a butane flame. During combustion, its peak heat release rate and total heat release are significantly decreased by 92.1% and 61.8% in contrast with control cotton fabric, and a flame-retardant mechanism is reasonably proposed by the condensed and gaseous analysis. Furthermore, the flame-retardant cotton fabric exhibits an excellent ultraviolet-blocking performance with the high ultraviolet protection factor of 201.51. Even after 300 cycles of abrasion, the coated cotton fabric retains the superior flame-retardant and ultraviolet-blocking properties. This work provides a simple and feasible strategy to prepare the multifunctional fabrics.