Steering surface topographies of electrospun fibers: understanding the mechanisms.
- Yazgan G Empa, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, Laboratory for Protection and Physiology, CH-9014, St. Gallen, Switzerland.
- Dmitriev RI School of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, University College Cork, College Road, Cork, Ireland.
- Tyagi V Empa, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, Laboratory for Protection and Physiology, CH-9014, St. Gallen, Switzerland.
- Jenkins J School of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, University College Cork, College Road, Cork, Ireland.
- Rotaru GM Empa, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, Laboratory for Protection and Physiology, CH-9014, St. Gallen, Switzerland.
- Rottmar M Empa, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, Laboratory for Biointerfaces, CH-9014, St. Gallen, Switzerland.
- Rossi RM Empa, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, Laboratory for Protection and Physiology, CH-9014, St. Gallen, Switzerland.
- Toncelli C Empa, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, Laboratory for Protection and Physiology, CH-9014, St. Gallen, Switzerland.
- Papkovsky DB School of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, University College Cork, College Road, Cork, Ireland.
- Maniura-Weber K Empa, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, Laboratory for Biointerfaces, CH-9014, St. Gallen, Switzerland.
- Fortunato G Empa, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology, Laboratory for Protection and Physiology, CH-9014, St. Gallen, Switzerland. giuseppino.fortunato@empa.ch.
- 2017-03-11
Published in:
- Scientific reports. - 2017
English
A profound understanding of how to tailor surface topographies of electrospun fibers is of great importance for surface sensitive applications including optical sensing, catalysis, drug delivery and tissue engineering. Hereby, a novel approach to comprehend the driving forces for fiber surface topography formation is introduced through inclusion of the dynamic solvent-polymer interaction during fiber formation. Thus, the interplay between polymer solubility as well as computed fiber jet surface temperature changes in function of time during solvent evaporation and the resultant phase separation behavior are studied. The correlation of experimental and theoretical results shows that the temperature difference between the polymer solution jet surface temperature and the dew point of the controlled electrospinning environment are the main influencing factors with respect to water condensation and thus phase separation leading to the final fiber surface topography. As polymer matrices with enhanced surface area are particularly appealing for sensing applications, we further functionalized our nanoporous fibrous membranes with a phosphorescent oxygen-sensitive dye. The hybrid membranes possess high brightness, stability in aqueous medium, linear response to oxygen and hence represent a promising scaffold for cell growth, contactless monitoring of oxygen and live fluorescence imaging in 3-D cell models.
- Language
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- English
- Open access status
- gold
- Identifiers
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- DOI 10.1038/s41598-017-00181-0
- PMID 28279011
- Persistent URL
- https://sonar.ch/global/documents/210203
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