Effect of dsDNA wrapped single-walled carbon nanotubes on the thermal and mechanical properties of polycaprolactone and polyglycolide fiber blend composites Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. The aim of this research is to create a stronger biopolymer/carbon nanotube composite suited for loadbearing biomedical applications. Electrospinning was used to fabricate a miscible polycaprolactone (PCL)/ polyglycolide (PGA) fiber blend in order to increase the interfacial bonding of the fibers to a PCL matrix. To further increase the strength of the composite, purified single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) wrapped with double stranded deoxyribonucleic acid (dsDNA) were introduced to the PCL-PGA fibers. Bulk PCL was compression molded to encapsulate the PCL-PGA blended fibers as well as the PCL-PGA/ dsDNA-SWNT fibers. Mechanical properties were determined with three-point bend testing to establish the composite's load transfer capabilities. It was demonstrated that incorporation of PCL-PGA/ dsDNA-SWNT fibers increased the strength and modulus over that of the bulk PCL and PCL-PGA fibers alone. Furthermore, the use of blended fibers allowed load transfer from the dsDNA-SWNTs to the PCL matrix.

published proceedings

  • POLYMER

altmetric score

  • 1.85

author list (cited authors)

  • Spearman, S. S., Irin, F., Rivero, I. V., Green, M. J., & Abidi, N.

citation count

  • 11

complete list of authors

  • Spearman, Shayla S||Irin, Fahmida||Rivero, Iris V||Green, Micah J||Abidi, Noureddine

publication date

  • January 2015