Design and Fabrication of Fibrous Nanomaterials Using Pull Spinning

Abstract

catalysts, [11,12] and optical devices. [13][14][15] Such a broad scope of applications demands versatile manufacturing techniques amenable to multiple materials processing and collection conditions. Currently, fiber-fabrication systems can be characterized as melt, [16][17][18] dry, [19,20] wet, [21][22][23] or electrospinning [24,25] -all of which produce nanofibers using high temperature and pressure (melt, dry, and wet spinning) or electric fields (5-20 kV, electrospinning). [24][25][26][27] Once formed, the fibers can be collected and processed using external pumps, alternating applied electric fields, spinnerets, coagulation, and wash chambers, or heated drum rolls to form aligned functional materials. [18,[24][25][26]28,29] Several electrospinning techniques have been developed to further control fiber deposition and structure, producing aligned fibrous nanostructures by minimizing the distance between a charged nozzle and grounded collector. [30][31][32][33][34][35] While these modifications enable geometries which were previously unattainable for electrospun fibers, the technique remains limited in both speed and the range of materials used. Furthermore, harsh reaction environments, The assembly of natural and synthetic polymers into fibrous nanomaterials has applications ranging from textiles, tissue engineering, photonics, and catalysis. However, rapid manufacturing of these materials is challenging, as the state of the art in nanofiber assembly remains limited by factors such as solution polarity, production rate, applied electric fields, or temperature. Here, the design and development of a rapid nanofiber manufacturing system termed pull spinning is described. Pull spinning is compact and portable, consisting of a high-speed rotating bristle that dips into a polymer or protein reservoir and pulls a droplet from solution into a nanofiber. When multiple layers of nanofibers are collected, they form a nonwoven network whose composition, orientation, and function can be adapted to multiple applications. The capability of pull spinning to function as a rapid, point-of-use fiber manufacturing platform is demonstrated for both muscle tissue engineering and textile design.

A tissue-engineered scale model of the heart ventricle

“…These features can be recapitulated using nanofibrous materials that are formed into cellular scaffolds with sufficient porosity to support cell infiltration and promote tissue morphogenesis 40 . We therefore developed a nanofiber ventricle chamber production strategy based on pull-spinning 46 fibers on a rotating ellipsoidal collector (Fig. 1b, Supplementary Fig.…”

“…PCL provides structural stability for the scaffold’s nanofibrous features during culture, while gelatin was chosen as an RGD-containing biopolymer derived from denatured collagen that improves scaffold binding to cells and biomolecules such as fibronectin 47,48 . We previously described anisotropic PCL/gelatin nanofiber production by pull spinning and their use to guide skeletal muscle tissue assembly 46 . Here, we used scanning electron microscopy (SEM) to confirm that PCL/gelatin nanofiber scaffolds were structurally comparable with decellularized human left ventricle tissue (Supplementary Fig.…”

Use of Polycaprolactone Electrospun Nanofibers as a Coating for Poly(methyl methacrylate) Bone Cement

“…This study is limited to the production of PCL nanofibers by an electrospinning method and blending of the produced PCL ENF with PMMA bone cement. There are several other methods, such as pressurized gyratory spinning [ 21 ] and pull spinning [ 22 ], which can be used to produce a PCL nanofiber membrane for the coating of bone cement. The capability of electrospinning to function as an automated, scaled, and point-of-use fiber manufacturing platform was demonstrated by Khandaker and Shahram [ 23 ].…”

Automatic diameter and orientation distribution determination of fibrous materials in micro X‐ray CT imaging data

“…Fibrous nanomaterials can be fabricated using a variety of techniques such as pull spinning, electrospinning and melt spinning, as compared in Deravi et al . (). Electrospinning is considered here because of its general applicability as it can be used to fabricate fibres consisting of polymers or biological materials such as collagen and elastin if desired, such as in Sensini et al .…”