Influence of the rheological behaviour in electrospun PCL nanofibres production for tissue engineering applicationss

A strategy to obtain functional tissues engineering with desired biomechanical properties was used to develop scaffolds with morphologies mimicking the native environment to guide tissue regeneration. Nonwoven scaffolds, with fibre dimensions at a nanometre scale, can mimic the physical structure of natural extracellular matrices (ECM). Though its clinical application is yet limited, nano/micro fibrous scaffolds produced by electrospinning gains more and more interest in different Tissue Engineering fields. The electrospinning technique is controlled by several parameters, such as polymer solution and processing ambient, being one of the most important parameters the solution viscosity, which allows defining the minimum viscosity needed to obtain fibres. This research work investigates the rheological behaviour of PCL solutions to produce nanoscale fibre meshes for cartilage application. Poly (e-caprolactone) (PCL) solutions were prepared using glacial acetic acid (AA) and glacial acetic acid with triethylamine (AA/TEA) at different concentrations. It was necessary to double the value of the critical concentration (c*), that is 10 wt% for PCL/AA and 9,6wt% for PCL/AA/TEA, to prepare suitable fibres. Results also show that a more homogenous mesh can be produced by adding TEA.