Preparation And Properties Of PA6 Nanofibers Containing Silver

In this paper, the PA6/Ag composite nanofibers were prepared using homemade electrospinning equipment, and the structure and properties of which were studied using modern analytical equipment. The study not only will promote the development of composite nano-materials, but also will provide some theoretical basis for potential applications of composite nanomaterial.In this research, silver colloid and nanosilver powder were used as functional carrier. According to the particle size distribution test result of silver colloid and nanosilver powder, silver colloid was added to PA6 spinning solution to make the nanofibers functionalized. The silver colloid was diluted to different concentrations and compounded with polyamide6 solution. Then the nanofiber containing silver particles were prepared via electrospinning. The antibacterial performances of PA6/Ag composite nanofibers obtained under different technological parameter were assessed using shake flask test. And the impacts of spinning solution and spinning parameters such as silver particles concentration, spinning solution concentration, spinning voltage and collection-spinning distance(C-SD) on antibacterial performance of samples were investigated.The results revealed that silver concentration was the key factors affecting antibacterial properties of the nanofibers. The anti-bacterial performance was significantly improved as the silver concentration increased. When the silver particle mass fraction achieved at 0.2% in the nylon6 nanofibre, the reduction percentage of escherichia coli and staphylococcus aureus exceeded over 90%. The solution concentration also has influence on antibacterial properties.As the increased solution concentration led to the larger average diameter, which caused the decreased specific surface area, then the silver particles dissolution amount decreased. Other parameters such as spinning voltage, C-SD, spinneret diameter etc., had slight influence on antibacterial properties.The diameter distribution and structures of nanofibers were analyzed by SEM images. The SEM images revealed that the silver particles concentration, solution concentration, spinning voltage, C-SD etc. has large influence on fiber morphology and the diameter distribution. The average diameter reduced and diameter distribution became narrower as the content of silver particles increased;the average diameter increased as the solution concentration raised;the average diameter first increased and then decreased as spinning voltage increased; the C-SD didn't have significant effect on the average diameter, but the diameter distribution became narrower obviously;the average diameter and diameter distribution became wider while the spinneret diameter extended. AFM was used to characterize the surface morphology of nanofibers. And the results indicated that ravine-shape structure was seemed to be more evidence as the content of silver particles increased. Moreover, the roughness of the fiber surface was investigated from transverse and axis directions using AFM software. The results indicated that the increased content of silver particles enhanced the surface roughness of nanofibers.TEM was used to observe the silver particles distribution in nanofibers,the pictures showed that the silver particles were well-distributed in the nanofibers. The crystal structure of nanofibers and slver particles were characterized by XRD images, a low crystallinity of nanofibers and some crystal structre of silver particles were observed in the images.Moreover, other performance of PA6/Ag composite nanofibers was also tested. The results showed that as the content of silver particles increased, the antistatic property obviously improved, while the mechanical properties weakened lightly.