Abstract
Textile engineering can offer a multi-scale toolbox via various fiber or textile fabrication methods to obtain woven or nonwoven aerogels with different structural and mechanical properties to overcome the current limitations of polysaccharide-based aerogels, such as poor mechanical properties and undeveloped shaping techniques. Hereby, a high viscous solution of microcrystalline cellulose and zinc chloride hydrate was wet spun to produce mono and multi-filament alcogel microfibers. Subsequently, cellulose aerogel fibers (CAF) were produced and impregnated with model drugs using supercritical CO2 processes. Fibers were characterized in terms of morphology and textural properties, thermal stability, mechanical properties, and in vitro biological and drug release assessments. Loaded and non-loaded CAFs proved to have a macro-porous outer shell and a nano-porous inner core with interconnected pore structure and a specific area in the range of 100–180 m2/g. The CAFs with larger diameter (d ~ 235 μm) were able to form knitted mesh while lower diameter fibers (d ~ 70 μm) formed needle punched nonwoven textiles. Humidity and water uptake assessments indicated that the fibrous structures were highly moisture absorbable and non-toxic with immediate drug release profiles due to the highly open interconnected porous structure of the fibers. Finally, CAFs are propitious to be further developed for biomedical applications such as drug delivery and wound care.
Highlights
IntroductionThere is a growing demand for nonwoven and woven materials that are mainly fabricated from petroleum-based resources; numerous research studies are trying to fabricate new value-added, sustainable, and competitive products originating from renewable ma terials such as cellulose [1,2,3]
Humidity and water uptake assessments indicated that the fibrous structures were highly moisture absorbable and non-toxic with immediate drug release profiles due to the highly open interconnected porous structure of the fibers
There is a growing demand for nonwoven and woven materials that are mainly fabricated from petroleum-based resources; numerous research studies are trying to fabricate new value-added, sustainable, and competitive products originating from renewable ma terials such as cellulose [1,2,3]
Summary
There is a growing demand for nonwoven and woven materials that are mainly fabricated from petroleum-based resources; numerous research studies are trying to fabricate new value-added, sustainable, and competitive products originating from renewable ma terials such as cellulose [1,2,3]. Textile engineering is offering a multiscale toolbox via various fabrication methods of fibers and fabrics for versatile biomedical applications. The current biomedical fibrous structures having a wide range of morphology, composition, and func tionality are used in different applications, such as personal protective textiles, skin grafts, tissue engineering scaffolds, and wound dressings [3,4]. Mild temperature supercritical carbon dioxide (scCO2) processes are currently utilized to produce highly porous and low-density material so-called aerogels [1,5]. Cellu lose aerogels (CAs), due to their biocompatibility and biodegradability as ultra-lightweight material with 3D interconnected porous network structure, have been used in drug delivery [6,7], tissue engineering [8,9], and wound healing [10,11] applications
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