Electrospun Poly(ε‐Caprolactone)/Silk Fibroin Coaxial Core‐Sheath Nanofibers Applied to Scaffolds and Drug Carriers. Issue 4 (31st January 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Zheng, Yahui; Su, Dan; Yuan, Jingjing; Zha, Li; Xiao, Yinghong; Che, Jianfei
• Is Part Of: Polymer engineering & science. Volume 60:Issue 4(2020)
• Page Start: 802
• Page End: 809
• Publication Date: 2020-01-31
• Subjects: Polymer engineering -- Periodicals; Polymers -- Periodicals; 668.9
• DOI: 10.1002/pen.25339
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0032-3888

Abstract

Abstract : Developing biologically mimetic nanofibers (NFs) is crucial for their applications as scaffolds in tissue engineering and drug carriers. Herein, we present a strategy to facilely fabricate core‐sheath NFs using coaxial electrospinning technique. Poly(ε‐caprolactone) (PCL) and silk fibroin (SF) were employed as component materials to construct PCL/SF NFs with PCL cores uniformly encapsulated by SF sheaths. Scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy demonstrate a uniform core‐sheath structure of the coaxial NFs. The engineered core‐sheath structure confers the composite NFs with greatly improved properties including surface hydrophilicity and mechanical properties. In vitro cell culture validates that the core‐sheath NFs are favorable to the cultured rat pheochromocytoma cells (PC 12) attachment. To further demonstrate the advantage of the coupled structural integrity, the PCL/SF core‐sheath NFs were compared with the NFs produced from PCL and SF blend. Results showed that the PCL/SF NFs possessed a tensile strength of ~6.93 ± 0.52 MPa and an elongation at break of ~294.31 ± 24.17%, whereas the blend NFs possessed ~5.55 ± 0.50 MPa and ~88.05 ± 13.98%, respectively. Dexamethasone‐phosphate sodium (DEX) was employed as a model drug, whereby the in vitro release study indicates that the NFs exhibit an ideal releasing profile, capable of releasing DEX continuously over a period of 450 h. The constructed PCL/SF core‐sheath NFs are promising candidates for biomedical applications. POLYM. ENG. SCI., 60:802–809, 2020. © 2020 Society of Plastics Engineers