(44a) Production And Characterization Of Core-Sheath Electrospun Nanofibers Doped With Carbon Nanotubes

Electrospinning is a process to develop fibers with diameters at the nanometer range. Recently much interest has been generated in this technique due to the large number of potential biomedical uses such as tissue engineering and drug delivery applications. Our effort has been to produce nanocomposite fibers utilizing carbon nanotubes for enhanced electrical conductivity. The optimization of the solution and process parameters such as solution viscosity and feed rate and polymer concentration, electric field, and the distance between needle and grounded collector are discussed. In addition, the fabrication of a core-sheath fiber structure is presented, with a core of poly (ethylene oxide) (PEO) and a sheath of PEO doped with carbon nanotubes (CNTs). It is shown that by confining the CNTs to the thin sheath-layer, the threshold for percolation (via electrical conductance) is reduced from that of one-dimensional single-component fibers and two- dimensional films.