Electro-spinning/netting: A strategy for the fabrication of three-dimensional polymer nano-fiber/nets

Abstract

a b s t r a c tSince 2006, a rapid development has been achieved in a subject area, so called electro-spinning/netting (ESN), which comprises the conventional electrospinning process and a unique electro-netting process. Electronetting overcomes the bottleneck problem of electrospinning technique and provides a versatile method for generating spider-web-like nanonets with ultrafine fiber diameter less than 20 nm. Nano-nets, supported by the conventional electrospun nanofibers in the nano-fiber/nets (NFN) membranes, exhibit numerious attractive characteristics such as extremely small diameter, high porosity, and Steiner tree network geometry, which make NFN membranes optimal candidates for many significant applications. The progress made during the last few years in the field of ESN is highlighted in this review, with particular emphasis on results obtained in the author's research units. After a brief description of the development of the electrospinning and ESN techniques, several fundamental properties of NFN nanomaterials are addressed. Subsequently, the used polymers and the state-of-the-art strategies for the controllable fabrication of NFN membranes are highlighted in terms of the ESN process. Additionally, we highlight some potential applications associated with the remarkable features of NFN nanostructure. Our discussion is concluded with some personal perspectives on the future development in which this wonderful technique could be pursued.

Ultralight nanofibre-assembled cellular aerogels with superelasticity and multifunctionality

“…Electrospun nanofibres, which are at the forefront of advanced fibrous materials, combine the robust mechanical strength, low density, fine flexibility, extremely high aspect ratio and ease of scalable synthesis from various materials (polymer, ceramic, metal, carbon and so on) [19][20][21] . These fibres hold great promise as an exceptional nanoscale building block for constructing macroscopic NFAs.…”

Hierarchical porous carbon nanofibers via electrospinning

“…Electrospinning shares the characteristics of both electrospraying and conventional solution dry spinning of fibers, and that makes the process particularly suited to the production of fibers using large and complex molecules on a multi-scale [7][8][9][10]. The right combination of electrospinning of organic polymers and subsequent thermal treatment in an inert atmosphere could lead to the mass production of CNFs.…”

Filtration Performance Against Nanoparticles by Electrospun Nylon-6 Media Containing Ultrathin Nanofibers

“…The same type of assumption was used by Brown (1993) for particles with large inertia. Based on the morphological studies of electrospun nanonets (Wang et al 2013), we simulate the structure of UNF zones by a layer of hexagonal nets of a uniform pore size (defined as the distance between the centers of two parallel UNFs) of D o , with each edge being one UNF with the diameter D UNF , as shown in Figure 2a. This structure has the advantage of the minimal material required for architectures and the fulfilment of the 120 joint of Steiner geometry.…”

“…Nonwoven nanofiber media have gained popularity in applications such as wound dressing, electrodes, sensors, catalysts, drug carriers, tissue scaffolds, battery/cell and capacitor, and filters (Lu and Ding 2008;Wang et al 2013). Nanofibers have excellent properties including high surface area to volume ratio, high porosity, flexibility in surface functionalities, and superior mechanical properties.…”

“…In addition, the formation mechanism of UNF structure is of interest, since its comprehension can help estimation of the UNF morphology, covering rate, and pore size and may lead to a better control of the UNF structure. Some previous researches have proposed a few formation mechanisms including phase separation of charged droplets (Ding et al 2006), ion initiated splitting (Wang et al 2013), and squeezed subsidiary (Tsou et al 2011). However, a consensus on this issue is still lacking.…”