Bleach catalyst enhancement
AssigneeUnilever Home & Personal Care USA, Division of Conopco, Inc.
InventorsRonald Hage, Jan Klugkist, Ton Swarthoff
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Abstract
The invention relates to catalytically bleaching substrates, especially laundry fabrics, with a bleaching catalyst in the presence of an enzymatic bleach enhancing system.
Claims19
A bleaching composition comprising an organic ligand which forms a complex with a transition metal for bleaching a substrate via atmospheric oxygen, the bleaching composition upon addition to an aqueous medium providing an aqueous bleaching medium substantially devoid of peroxygen bleach or a peroxy-based or peroxyl-generating bleach system, together with an oxidizable precursor selected from the group consisting of:
- (i) an unsaturated acid or alkali metal salt thereof;
- and (ii) a generating system for producing an unsaturated acid in situ in an aqueous medium,
- together with an enzyme for oxidising the oxidizable precursor to form a hydroperoxide in situ.
A bleaching composition comprising:
- (i) a transition metal catalyst for bleaching a substrate via atmospheric oxygen;
- (ii) 5,000-1,000,000 Lipoxygenase Units per gram of bleaching composition;
- and,
- (iii) 10-20,000 Lipase Units per gram of bleaching composition, wherein
- the bleaching composition comprises less than 1% wt/wt of a peroxygen bleach.
A process for bleaching a stain comprising the steps of treating a textile with a bleaching composition comprising an organic ligand which forms a complex with a transition metal for bleaching a substrate via atmospheric oxygen, the bleaching composition upon addition to an aqueous medium providing an aqueous bleaching medium substantially devoid of a peroxygen bleach or a peroxy-based or peroxyl-generating bleach system, together with an oxidizable precursor selected from the group consisting of:
- (i) an unsaturated acid or alkali metal salt thereof, and (ii) a generating system for producing an unsaturated acid in situ in an aqueous medium and an enzyme for oxidising the oxidizable precursor to form a hydroperoxide in situ.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.