Nanofiber-Based Odor-Free Medical Mask Fabrication Using Polyvinyl Butyral and Eucalyptus Anti Odor Agent

Abstract

Following the 2020 COVID-19 worldwide outbreak, many countries adopted sanitary and safety measures to safeguard public health such as wearing medical face mask. While face masks became a necessity for people, disadvantages impede their long period wearing such as uncomfortable breathability and odor. The intermediate layer of the medical face mask is composed of porous non-woven fabric to block external particles while maintaining breathability. To overcome aforementioned limitation, this study uses electrospinning to design and fabricate odorless face masks via the use of aromatic oil. Eucalyptus essential oil is encapsulated through mixing and layer-by-layer by hydrophobic polyvinyl butyral and further used to fabricate the medical mask intermediate layer. We found that adding 0.2 g of eucalyptus into polyvinyl butyral fabric through mixing results in the deodorization rate of 80% after 2 h, with fabric thickness of 440.9 μm, and melt-blown non-woven fabric thickness of 981.7 μm. The Particle Filtration Efficiency of 98.3%, Bacterial Filtration Efficiency above 99.9%, and the differential pressure of 4.7 mm H2O/cm2 meet the CNS 14774 standard on medical face masks. Therefore, this study successfully proved that this type of masks’ middle layer not only effectively protects against coronavirus, but also provides better scents and makes it more comfortable for consumers.

Electrospun PAN/CuO/curcumin composite nanofiber mats for efficient antimicrobial face masks

“…The incorporation of a nanofiber mat between the polypropylene sheets improved the filtering capacity. [63][64][65][66][67][68][69][70][71] The sandwich-style mask was fabricated using PAN/CuO and PAN/CuO/curcumin nanofibers. The mask construction consisted of two polypropylene sheets and an antibacterial nanofiber mat.…”

A novel investigations on medical and non-medical mask performance with influence of marine waste microplastics (polypropylene)

“…Salt particles are micron-sized particles that can quickly enter the human respiratory system; one of the properties of the melt-blown fabric is that it prevents this entry. A small and porous formation in the fabric structure prevents larger particles from passing through the masks ( Benas et al, 2022 ). Contrary to popular belief, tiny particles <3 mm in size are difficult to prevent due to the size of the structure ( Brochocka et al, 2020 ; Li et al, 2020 ).…”