Needleless Electrospinning Method Based on Tip Effect of Conductor

doi:10.7503/cjcu20160851

Abstract

Abstract:

An electrospinning method was proposed based on the principle of tip effect of conductor, in which the probe array is inserted in sequence and kept perpendicularly to the bottom of the polymer solution bath, with the tips of probes close to the fluid level. When a high voltage is applied to the solution, a peak electric field will be created in the vicinity of the probes. Due to instability of the fluid in the electric field, the jet can spontaneously form at the electric field peak on the solution surface, and then it is stretched and thinned, splitting into wires and solidifying on the receiving plate. However, there is also mutual interference of the electric field between the ordered probe arrays. Simulation and optimization is needed to obtain the best spinning electric field. The geometric model was established with COMSOL Multiphysics 5.0. The effects of the length, number, spacing and geometric arrangement of the embedded probes on the peak value of the field intensity on the surface of the solution were analyzed. It is found that the convex arc-shaped geometric arrangement can increase the peak value of the field intensity when one row of probes is embedded in the solution bath, the staggered arrangement is helpful to improve the uniformity of the electric field when two rows of probes are embedded, while the effects of parallel arrangement and diagonal arrangement on the equilibrium field intensity are not obvious.

Key words: Electrospinning, Tip effect, Electric field intensity

CLC Number:

O631

TrendMD:

CHEN Yunjun, DAI Hongchao, WANG Wei, QIANG Wei. Needleless Electrospinning Method Based on Tip Effect of Conductor[J]. Chem. J. Chinese Universities, 2017, 38(6): 975.

Figures/Tables 7

Fig.1 Schematic diagram of electrospinning equipment based on tip effect of conductor

Table 1 Parameters of finite element model

Side length of surface without wire/cm	Solution bath/cm	Receiving plate/cm	Receiving distance/cm	Probe diameter/mm
40	18×8×6	30×30×0.5	18	0.5

Fig.2 Graphic view of the complete setup constructed in COMSOL(A) and electric field intensity distribution on the solution surface(B)

Fig.3 Electric field distribution on the solution surface for different probe spacings(A) Probe length is 5 cm; (B) probe length is 4.95 cm.

Fig.4 Distribution of tip electric field intensity when three probes are arranged horizontally

Fig.5 Comparison of electric field peak values on solution surface in horizontal and convex arcs-haped arrangements

Fig.6 Parallel arrangement(A, A'), diagonal arrangement(B, B') and staggered arrangement models(C, C') in COMSOL(A—C) and electric fields on the solution surface corresponding to the three arrangements(A'—C')

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