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Control of the morphology of micro/nanostructures of polycarbonate via electrospinning

  • Special Topic/Articles/Biomedical Materials
  • Published:
Chinese Science Bulletin

Abstract

Many of the applications proposed for bioassays, scaffolds for tissue engineering, filtrations, and supports for catalysts require polymeric membranes with large specific surface areas. Polycarbonate (PC) is a possible candidate for these applications because of its excellent mechanical performance and good biocompatibility. Electrospinning is a simple and effective method for large-scale fabrication of micro-/nano- fibrous membranes with large specific surface areas. How to control the morphology of electrospun PC fibers, however, has not been systematically investigated. We describe the controllable fabrication of continuous and uniform PC fibers. We electrospin PC/chloroform solutions doped with different types of surfactants including anionic, zwitterionic, nonionic and cationic surfactants. Only cationic surfactants can lead to the successful fabrication of uniform PC fibers. After the analysis of the correlation between solution properties such as viscosity, surface tension, and conductivity and the morphology of electrospun fibers, we conclude that the addition of cationic surfactants such as cetane trimethyl ammonium bromide (CTAB) that leads to a decrease in viscosity is the main factor responsible for the formation of PC fibers. The demonstration of the fabrication of uniform PC fibers will lend experience to processing other polymers into fibers via electrospinning.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Center for Nanoscience and Technology, Beijing, 100190, China

    DaYong Yang, Yang Wang, DongZhou Zhang, YingYi Liu & XingYu Jiang

  2. Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics (SINANO), Chinese Academy of Sciences, Suzhou, 215125, China

    DaYong Yang

  3. Graduate University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100864, China

    YingYi Liu

Authors
  1. DaYong Yang
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  2. Yang Wang
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  3. DongZhou Zhang
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  4. YingYi Liu
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  5. XingYu Jiang
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to XingYu Jiang.

Additional information

Supported by the Innovation Program of Chinese Academy of Sciences, National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 20605006 & 20890020) and Ministry of Science and Technology of China (Grant Nos. 2006CB705600, 2006AA03Z323 and 2009CB930001)

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Yang, D., Wang, Y., Zhang, D. et al. Control of the morphology of micro/nanostructures of polycarbonate via electrospinning. Chin. Sci. Bull. 54, 2911–2917 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11434-009-0241-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11434-009-0241-0

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