Preparati(o)n of Poly(vinyl alcohol)/Chitosan Oligosaccharide/MMT Nanofibers in Aqueous Solutions

摘要

@@1.Introduction Electrospinning technique has attracted great interest among the academic and industrial scientists because it is a very simple and effective approach to produce nanofibers which have be found attractive for various applications in biomedical engineering, filtration, protective clothing, catalysis reaction and sensors [1,2], Montmorillonite (MMT) has been attracting great attention due to its remarkable improvement in mechanical, thermal, flame-retardant, and barrier properties of polymeric composites with small amounts (1-10wt.%) of MMT fillers added. Poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) is a semi-crystalline hydrophilic polymer with good chemical and thermal stability. PVA is a highly biocompatible and non-toxic polymer. These properties have led to the use of PVA in a wide range of applications in medical, cosmetic, food, pharmaceutical and packaging industries. Chitosan is an N-deacetylated derivative of chitin, the second most abundant polysaccharide in nature after cellulose. It is generally regarded as non-toxic, biocompatible and biodegradable [3]. It has many unique functional properties for different applications like high molecular weight, high viscosity, high crystallinity and capacity to hydrogen bond intermolecularly. However, the rigid D-glucosamine structure and high crystallinity in Chitosan usually lead to poor solubility of chitosan in common organic solvents as well as in water, such as at physiological pH values (7.2-7.4), restricting its uses, especially in human body. However, partially depolymerized chitosan products, I.e., low molecular weight chitosan (chitosan oligosaccharide), could overcome these limitations and hence find much wider applications in diversified fields. In this work, we prepared PVA/Chitosan oligosaccharide(COS)/MMT nanofibers in aqueous solution to improve nanofiber's mechanical and thermal property.