Non-Woven Filters Made of PLA via Solution Blowing Process for Effective Aerosol Nanoparticles Filtration

Abstract

With the development of civilization, the awareness of the impact of versatile aerosol particles on both human health and the environment is growing. New materials are needed to purify the air to control this impact The aspect of processing the produced waste is not negligible. In view of the above, this study proposes utilizing the solution blow spinning process (SBS) for manufacturing a biodegradable filtration structure that ensures high efficiency of nanoobject filtration, with a low pressure drop. Polylactic acid (PLA) was used to produce a nanofiber layer on the coconut substrate. The advantage of this method is the ability to blow fibers with diameters in the nano-scale, applying relatively simple, cost-effective, and easy to scale-up equipment. This work selected appropriate process parameters to produce good quality filters. Moreover, the process conditions influence on the morphology of the obtained structures and, thus, also the filtration properties, were examined. For tested solutions, i.e., 4% and 6%, the mean fiber diameter decreased as the concentration decreased. Therefore, the overall filtering efficiency increased as the concentration of the used solution decreased. The produced structures exhibited approximately 70% filtration efficiency for particles ranging from 0.02 to 0.2 μm with a pressure drop of less than 60 Pa. Obtained results are optimistic and are a step in producing efficient, biodegradable filters to remove nanoparticles from air.