Electrospinning of chitosan

An electrospun nonwoven fabric of a cationic polysaccharide, chitosan, was successfully prepared. The present study focuses on the effect of the electrospinning solvent and the chitosan concentration on the morphology of the resulting nonwoven fabrics. The solvents tested were dilute hydrochloric acid, acetic acid, neat formic acid and trifluoroacetic acid. As the chitosan concentration was increased, the morphology of the deposition on the collector changed from spherical beads to interconnected fibrous networks. The addition of dichloromethane to the chitosan-TFA solution improved the homogeneity of the electrospun chitosan fiber. Under optimized conditions, homogenous (not interconnected) chitosan fibers with a mean diameter of 330 nm were prepared.