Abstract
A highly improved strategy is established in order to systematically integrate excess exfoliated graphene oxide (GO) as fillers into polyacrylonitrile (PAN) nanofibers via electrospinning. Simple modification of GO surface allowed for their loading efficiency into the nanofibers to surpass the typical limits. Among many features, the hydrophilic and mechanical properties of these membranes were found to be significantly increased compared to the original PAN and bare GO-loaded membranes probably due to the effective reinforcing filler effect caused by the even distribution of the modified GO within the PAN nanofibers. Thus, the simple surface modification of fillers can facilitate the capability of controlling the loading efficiency into electrospun nanofibers which can highly impact the quality and performance of final composite membranes.
Highlights
Nanoscale polymer fibers have been intensively investigated to implement their properties associated with high surface area, flexibility, and tunable porosity in many technical fields [1,2].Electrospinning is one of the common approaches to prepare polymer nanofibers due to high product rate, ecofriendly manufacturing process, and low production cost [1,2,3]
We demonstrated the capability of loading excess graphene oxide (GO) fillers into relatively hydrophilic polyacrylonitrile (PAN) nanofibers without significant destruction of their original structures, allowing for examining the overall properties of composite membranes impacted by the excess filler loading
The resulting composite membranes did not show any notable defects, possibly providing an opportunity to understand their overall properties as a function of GO content beyond typical limits
Summary
Electrospinning is one of the common approaches to prepare polymer nanofibers due to high product rate, ecofriendly manufacturing process, and low production cost [1,2,3] This process involves the generation of ultrathin fibrous threads from a polymer precursor solution in electric fields, but the resulting materials prepared from bare polymers typically exhibit inherently weak chemical and physical characteristics, often limiting their practical applications. Given the functional groups of GO, its surface can be modified with a positively charged surfactant, which makes GO more compatible in a polymer precursor solution [7] This simple modification allowed for the reliable integration of excess GO into PAN nanofibers under the same electrospinning conditions. The resulting composite membranes did not show any notable defects, possibly providing an opportunity to understand their overall properties as a function of GO content beyond typical limits
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