Solventless High Throughput Manufacturing of Poly(butylene terephthalate) Nanofibers

Abstract

A thin layer of fibers was attached to the SEM sample holder with double sided carbon tape and sputter coated with Au/Pd to minimize charging. The coated samples were imaged by Hitachi S-4500 SEM at an accelerating voltage of 15 kV. Several low and high magnification images were

Rotary jet spinning review – a potential high yield future for polymer nanofibers

“…According to Tan et al, 173 , the practicalities of testing individual nanofibers have the following five challenges: (1) Ability to manipulate extremely small fibers, terephthalate (PBT) when altering the processing temperature. 65 Their data in Table 6 show that for a rotational speed of 12,000 rpm, the fiber diameter changed from 1.64 μm at 280 °C to 1.17 μm at 320 °C. This demonstrates that for PBT, an increase in processing temperature leads to thinner fibers.…”

“…Fiber diameter measurements are a common and effective characterization method which is typically conducted using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), 71,74,145 optical microscopy (OM) 65 or transmission electron microscopy (TEM) 172 for imaging purposes.…”

Occurrence and morphology of bead-on-string structures in centrifugal forcespun PA6 fibers

“…For instance, a second nanofiber spinning technology called Forcespinning™ has in recent years become commercially available. This new process employs centrifugal force to draw fibers from polymer solutions or melts and attenuate their diameter into the nanoscale (Lozano & Sarkar, 2009;Padron et al, 2012;Sarkar et al, 2010;Shanmuganathan et al, 2012). In Forcespinning, the liquid jet is ejected through multiple orifices lining the periphery of a spinneret that rotates at high speed (2000-20,000 rpm).…”

“…In Forcespinning, the liquid jet is ejected through multiple orifices lining the periphery of a spinneret that rotates at high speed (2000-20,000 rpm). It is then stretched and attenuated under the centrifugal drawing forces (Lozano & Sarkar, 2009;Padron, Caruntu, & Lozano, 2011;Sarkar et al, 2010;Shanmuganathan et al, 2012). Given the principle of Forcespinning, there are competing forces that govern fiber formation and impact its morphology.…”

“…This is different from the case of electrospinning, where the draw ratio is controlled by the electric fields, independently from the material delivery rate controlled through the syringe pump. These conflicting phenomena have been evidenced in recent studies focusing on Forcespinning, where the spinneret rotation speed appeared to have little effect on fiber diameter (Hammami, Krifa, & Harzallah, 2014;Shanmuganathan et al, 2012), while other studies indicate the potential for a significant impact (McEachin & Lozano, 2012;Padron et al, 2011Padron et al, , 2012. Shanmuganathan et al (2012) investigated melt Forcespinning of Poly(butylene terephthalate) and noted that melt temperature may be a more important determinant of fiber diameter than spinneret rotation speed.…”