The Effect Of Vitamin C To PVA/SF Solution And Their Electrospinning

Non-woven membranes made by electrospinning have high porosity, high specific surface and low diameter. They have a broad range of potential applications in many areas such as filters, wound dressings and tissue engineering scaffolds. Nanofibers based on polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and silk fibroin (SF) have attracted a great deal of attention due to its good biocompatibility.The purpose of this study is looking for biocompatible additives which could weaken the tangles between PVA or SF molecules in aqueous solution in order to improve the electrospinning speed of PVA aqueous solution, enhance the stability of SF aqueous solution. The following main parts are included in this paper:Vitamin C (VC), Arbutin (AR) and Sodium Salicylate (SS) which have very good compatibility were added into PVA solution. The effect of them on rheological properties and electrospinning performance of PVA aqueous solution were investigated. The results showed that all of the three polyols could reduce the apparent viscosity of PVA aqueous solution. Under the same blending ratio, the viscosity of PVA / VC blend aqueous solution was minimum, this indicated VC had the most effective untangle impact on PVA aqueous solution. PVA / VC, PVA / SS and PVA / AR blend nanofibers were successfully prepared by electrospinning. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) analysis showed that all of the three kinds of blend nanofibers had uniform and smooth surface. Electospinning process had not cause a separation between polyols and PVA molecules. However, only the existence of VC significantly improved the electrospinning speed PVA solution.The impact of blend ratio between PVA and VC on PVA aqueous solution performance and electrospinning speed were investigated. Fourier transformed infra-red spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), Thermal performance test analyzer (TG-DTA) were used to analyze the characteristic of nanofibers made by electrospinning. The results showed that the viscosity of aqueous solution decreased with the increase of blend ratio and blend time. FT-IR, XRD and TG-DTA analysis results showed that there existed interaction between hydroxyl groups of PVA molecular chains and those of VC molecular chains. Furthermore, the addition of VC improved the elongation at break of PVA nanowovens.The stability of the SF aqueous solution reduced with the increase of solution concentration. Considering the impact of VC on PVA solution, we tested the effect of VC on the stability of silk fibroin (SF) aqueous solution. Gel time results showed that the stability of SF aqueous solution could be enhanced by adding a certain amount of VC. PVA/SF/VC blend nanofibers were prepared by electrospinning. The results showed that VC could not improve the electrospinning performance of PVA/SF blend solution.