Combining melt electrospinning and particulate leaching for fabrication of porous microfibers

Melt electrospinning technique is used in combination with particulate leaching technique to fabricate highly porous poly (ε-caprolactone) (PCL) fibers. Water soluble sugar particles are added into PCL prior to melt electrospinning. Various sugar concentrations are added to PCL to determine the effect of increasing sugar concentrations on fiber porosity. As the sugar concentration increases, fiber porosity is increased. Two nozzle diameters of 500 μm and 1000 μm are used to produce different fiber diameters. The resulting porosities between the two different fiber diameters are similar, and therefore the nozzle diameter does not seem to have any impact on the porosity.