In situ nanofibers patterned deposition based on electrostatic attraction–repulsion induction

Abstract

The in situ nanofibers patterned deposition technique, enabling polymer nanofibers to be deposited into pre-designed patterns with high accuracy, have an extensive application prospects in many fields. Currently, the solutions of realizing the highly accurate patterning deposition all have shortcomings, such as simple pattern structure, inaccurate nanofibers deposition, fewer available material types, complex and expensive manufacturing processes, chemical pollution, etc. Here, in order to enable polymer nanofibers to be deposited into pre-designed patterns with comprehensive advantages including highly accurate deposition of multiple pattern structures, more available materials, economically efficient and environmentally friendly, an in-situ nanofibers patterned deposition technique(in-situ NFs-PDT) is proposed, based on the induction of attractive and repulsive forces of static electricity. This in-situ NFs-PDT is achieved by improving the collection terminal of electrospinning, which includes a pre-designed target pattern electrode, an insulating layer and a repulsive positive bottom electrode. By controlling the repulsion voltage and thickness of target pattern electrode, the amount of nanofibers deposited in the unpatterned template region can reach 0. In addition, in order to validate and demonstrate high-accuracy in-situ NFs-PDT, a sensor array that can sense the tensile deformation of the epidermal layer of human skin is successfully designed and fabricated.