Polymeric nanostructured items electrospun on a cylindrical template: a simple procedure for their removal

Summary

Electrospinning fibres onto a rotating cylindrical rod or mandrel is one of the simplest ways to build tubular nanofibrous constructs — for example, scaffolds for vascular grafts and other tissue-engineering applications. In practice, however, detaching the deposited tube from the template without tearing it is a well-known difficulty: the fibre mesh adheres strongly to the collector, and the high rotation speeds used to align fibres make removal even harder. In this short communication, researchers from the BIOlab group at the University of Pisa describe a simple, practical procedure for removing polymeric nanostructured items that have been electrospun on a cylindrical template, so that intact tubular constructs can be recovered reliably. By addressing a common bottleneck in the fabrication of electrospun tubes, the method complements the group's broader work on nanofibrous scaffolds for biomedical applications and makes tubular electrospun devices easier to produce reproducibly.

Authors & Affiliations

• Cesare Errico

  Laboratory of Bioactive Polymeric Materials (BIOlab), Department of Chemistry and Industrial Chemistry, University of Pisa, San Piero a Grado, Pisa, Italy
• Nicola Detta

  Laboratory of Bioactive Polymeric Materials (BIOlab), Department of Chemistry and Industrial Chemistry, University of Pisa, San Piero a Grado, Pisa, Italy
• Dario Puppi

  Laboratory of Bioactive Polymeric Materials (BIOlab), Department of Chemistry and Industrial Chemistry, University of Pisa, San Piero a Grado, Pisa, Italy
• Anna Maria Piras

  Laboratory of Bioactive Polymeric Materials (BIOlab), Department of Chemistry and Industrial Chemistry, University of Pisa, San Piero a Grado, Pisa, Italy
• Federica Chiellini

  Laboratory of Bioactive Polymeric Materials (BIOlab), Department of Chemistry and Industrial Chemistry, University of Pisa, San Piero a Grado, Pisa, Italy
• Emo Chiellini

  Laboratory of Bioactive Polymeric Materials (BIOlab), Department of Chemistry and Industrial Chemistry, University of Pisa, San Piero a Grado, Pisa, Italy

Topics

Linari Electrospinning Systems