Open AccessElectrostatic Self-Assembly of Composite Nanofiber Yarn
Author(s) -
WeiChih Wang,
Yen-Tse Cheng,
Benjamin Estroff
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
polymers
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.77
H-Index - 73
ISSN - 2073-4360
DOI - 10.3390/polym13010012
Subject(s) - materials science , nanofiber , electrospinning , polystyrene sulfonate , composite material , pedot:pss , polymer , composite number , ethylene glycol , acrylate , chemical engineering , copolymer , engineering
Electrospinning polymer fibers is a well-understood process primarily resulting in random mats or single strands. More recent systems and methods have produced nanofiber yarns (NFY) for ease of use in textiles. This paper presents a method of NFY manufacture using a simplified dry electrospinning system to produce self-assembling functional NFY capable of conducting electrical charge. The polymer is a mixture of cellulose nanocrystals (CNC), polyvinyl acrylate (PVA) and poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) polystyrene sulfonate (PEDOT:PSS). When treated with ethylene glycol (EG) to enhance conductivity, fibers touching the collector plate align to the applied electrostatic field and grow by twisting additional nanofiber polymers injected by the jet into the NFY bundle. The longer the electrospinning continues, the longer and more uniformly twisted the NFY becomes. This process has the added benefit of reducing the electric field required for NFY production from >2.43 kV cm -1 to 1.875 kV cm -1 .