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Melt electrospinning using Polycaprolactone (PCL) polymer for various applications: experimental and theoretical analysis

This thesis presents a melt electrospinning technique to fabricate highly porous and controllable poly (ε-caprolactone) (PCL) microfibers for tissue engineering applications and rehabilitation applications. Electrospinning without solvents via melt methods may be an attractive approach to tissue engineering of cell constructs where solvent accumulation or toxicity is an issue. This method is also able to produce microfibers with controllable parameters. However, the fiber diameters resulting from melt electrospinning processes are relatively large when compared to the fibers from solution electrospinning. The typical microfiber diameter from melt electrospinning was reported to be approximately 0.1mm. In order to further develop the melt electrospinning technique, we focused on the design of a melt electrospinning setup based on numerical analysis using the Solidworks 2013 simulation package and practically established a melt electrospinning setup and thermal control system for accurate experiments. One of main purposes of this thesis is the build-up of mathematical modeling to control and predict the electrospun microfiber via a more intricate understanding of their parameters such as the nozzle diameter, applied voltage, distance between the nozzle and counter electrode, temperature, flow rate, linear transitional speed, among others. The model is composed of three parts: 1) melt electrospinning process modeling, 2) fibrous helix movement modeling, and 3) build-up of microfibers modeling. The melt electrospinning process model describes an electric field, the shape of jet’s continuously changing shape, and how the polymer melt is stretched into a Taylor cone and a straight jet. The fibrous helix movement model describes movement of electrospun microfibers influenced by Lorentz force, which moves along the helix pattern. Lastly, the build-up microfiber modeling describes the accumulation of the extruded microfibers on both flat and round counter electrodes based on the physical forces involved. These models are verified by experimental data from our own customized melt electrospinning setup. Moreover, the fabricated scaffolds are tested by seeding neural progenitors derived from murine R1 embryonic stem cell lines and it demonstrates the potential of scaffolds for tissue engineering applications. To increase cell attachment and proliferation, highly porous microfibers are fabricated by combination of melt electrospinning and particulate leaching technique. Finally, auxetic stretchable PCL force sensors are fabricated by melt electrospinning for hand rehabilitation. These stretchable sensors can be used to measure applied external loads or displacement and are also attachable to various substrates. We have attempted to apply the sensors to real human hand in order to prove their functionality. / Graduate / jko@me.uvic.ca

  1. http://hdl.handle.net/1828/5814
  2. Junghyuk Ko, Martin B. Jun, Gabriele Gilardi, Edmund Haslam, Edward J. Park, 2011, Fuzzy PWM-PID control of cocontracing antagonistic shape memory alloy muscle pairs in an artificial finger, Mechatronics, Vol. 21(7), pp. 1190-1202.
  3. Maxym Rukosuyev, Laura Dutton, Junghyuk Ko, Martin B.G. Jun, 2011, Design and Fabrication of a Three Dimensional Commemorative Artistic Plaque, J of Mechanics Engineering and Automation (JMEA), Vol. 1, No. 4.
  4. Junghyuk Ko, Kathleen Kolehmainen, Farid Ahmed, Martin B.G. Jun, Stephanie M. Willerth, 2012, Towards high throughput tissue engineering: development of chitosan-calcium phosphate scaffolds for engineering bone tissue from embryonic stem cell, Am J Stem Cell, Vol.1(1), pp 81-89.
  5. Junghyuk Ko, Nima Khadem Mohtaram, Farid Ahmed, Amy Montgomery, Michael Carlson, Patrick C.D. Lee, Stephanie M. Willerth, Martin B.G. Jun, Fabrication of poly (ε-caprolactone) microfibers scaffolds with varying topography and mechanical properties for stem cell-based tissue engineering application, 2014, Journal of Biomaterials Science Polymer Edition, 25(1), p. 1-17.
  6. S K Bhullar, J Ko, F Ahmed and MBG Jun, Design and fabrication of stent with negative Poisson’s ratio, 2014, International Journal of Mechanical, Aerospace, Industrial and Mechatronics Engineering, 8(2), p. 446-452.
  7. Junghyuk Ko, Sukhwinder Bhullar, Nima Khadem Mohtaram, Stephanie M. Willerth, and Martin B.G. Jun, Controlling Topographical Properties of Poly (ε-caprolactone) Melt Electrospun Scaffolds through Mathematical Modeling, 2014, Journal of Micromechanics and Microengineering, 25(1), doi: 10.1080/09205063.2013.830913.
  8. Junghyuk Ko, Dayun Kan, and Martin B.G. Jun, Combining melt electrospinning and particulate leaching for fabrication of porous microfibers, 2015, Journal of Manufacturing letters, 3, p. 5-8.
  9. Sukhwinder Bhullar, Junghyuk Ko, Yonghyun Cho, and Martin B.G. Jun, Development of an Auxetic Biodegradable Non-Woven Polymer Stent, 2014, accepted for publication in Journal of Polymer-Plastics Technology and Engineering, LPTE-2014-3540.
  10. Nima Khadem Mohtaram, Junghyuk Ko, Amy Montgomery, Michael Carlson, Lin Sun, Alix Wong, Meghan Robinson, Martin Byung-Guk Jun, and Stephanie M. Willerth, Multifuntional Electrospun Scaffolds for Promoting Neuronal Differentiation of Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells, 2014, Journal of Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering, 14-184-R.
  11. Nima Khadem Mohtaram, Junghyuk Ko, Craig King, Lin Su, Nathan Muller, Martin Byung-Guk Jun and Stephanie M. Willerth, Electrospun biomaterial scaffolds with varied topographies for neuronal differentiation of human induced pluripotent stem cells, 2014, Journal of Biomedical Materials Research, JBMR-A-14-0924.
  12. Nima Khadem Mohtaram, Junghyuk Ko, Andrew Agbay, David Rattray, Paul O’Neill, Azra Rajwani, Rishi Vasandani, Hien Luong Thu, Martin Byung-Guk Jun and Stephanie M. Willerth, Controlled Release of Glial cell-derived Neurotrophic Factor from Aligned Electrospun Nanofibers, 2014, submitted to Journal of Controlled Release.
  13. Junghyuk Ko, Nima Khadem Mohtaram, Patrick C.D. Lee, Stephanie M. Willerth, and Martin B.G. Jun, Mathematical model for predicting topographical properties of poly (ε-caprolactone) melt electrospun scaffolds in various temperature and linear transitional speed, 2014, submitted to Journal of Micromechanics and Microengineering.
  14. Junghyuk Ko, Seungwon Tim Jun, Jason Keonhag Lee, and Martin B.G. Jun, Effects of varying molecular weight with increasing temperature on poly (ε-caprolactone) melt electrospun fiber diameter, 2014, submitted to Journal of Polymer Engineering and Science.
Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:uvic.ca/oai:dspace.library.uvic.ca:1828/5814
Date23 December 2014
CreatorsKo, Junghyuk
ContributorsJun, Martin Byung-Guk
Source SetsUniversity of Victoria
LanguageEnglish, English
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeThesis
RightsAvailable to the World Wide Web

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