Fabrication and characterization study of electrospun quantum dot — poly vinyl alcohol composite nanofiber for novel engineering applications

Abstract

CdTe quantum dot/PVA (poly vinyl alcohol) composite nanofiber was successfully fabricated by eletrospinning process. CdTe quantum dots were uniformly dispersed and stabilized into solid nanofiber structure. Spectrofluorometer analysis revealed whenever Q.D’s enter to the PVA solution, due to the aggregation of Q.D’s red shift happens; however, when blend Q.D-PVA solution changes to nanofiber form via electrospining, this shift phenomenon offsets and original fluorescence properties of Q.D’s does not degraded due to excellent individual dispersion of Q.D in the nanofibers structure. It is also turned out that the proportion of Q.D’s incorporated in the composite solution of electrospining has strong influence on the nanofiber morphology. Addition of Q.D’s to PVA solution causes remarkable changes in the conductivity and solution viscosity, therefore different nanofiber morphologies can be obtained as evidenced by scanning electron microscopy. Furthermore, differential scanning calorimetric (DSC) revealed addition of small amount of Q.D’s to the electrospining solution causes strenuous improvement in crystalinity and heat of nanofiber fusion. Fluorescence and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) measurements confirmed the evenly dispersion of the Q.D’s into nanofibers structures.