Branched nanofibers for biodegradable facemasks by double bubble electrospinning

Journal: Acta Chemica Malaysia (ACMY)
Author: Muhammad Ali, Qura Tul Ain and Ji HuanHe

ISSN: 2576-6732
e-ISSN: 2576-6724

This is an open access journal distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License CC BY 4.0, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/acmy-2020-0007

World health organization (WHO) data shows that air pollution kills an estimated seven million people worldwide every year. A nanofiber based biodegradable facemask can keep breath from smoke and other particles suspended in the air. In this study, we propose branched polymeric nanofibers as a biodegradable material for air filters and facemasks. Fibers have been elecrospun using double bubble electrospinning technique. Biodegradable polymers, PVA and PVP were used in our experiment. Two tubes, each filled with one of the polymers, were supplied with air from the bottom to form bubbles of polymer solutions. DC 35-40 kV was used to deposit the fibers on an aluminum foil. Results show that the combination of polymers under specific conditions produced branched fibers with average nanofibers diameter of 495nm. FT-IR results indicate the new trends in the graph of composite nanofibers.