Producing polymer fibers by electrospinning in supercritical fluids

Nanofibers have a wide range of applications, including filtration and biomedical engineering. Porous or hollow fibers with large surface-to-volume ratios are more popular in some fields than the common nanofibers. Porous nanofibers can be obtained through electrospinning with highly volatile solvents or through special treatment following electrospinning. A new process where electrospinning is conducted in supercritical or near-critical CO₂ to produce porous or hollow nanofibers has been summarized. In addition, a process entailing compressed N₂-assisted electrospinning was attempted to produce PVP nanofibers in this work, but it was proved to be unsuccessful. Since the fiber morphologies are dependent on the phase behavior of organic solvents in supercritical fluids, ASPEN PLUS 2006 was used to simulate the phase equilibrium of the solvent-supercritical fluid system to explain why porous or hollow fibers can be obtained in compressed CO₂, but not in compressed N₂.