The New Jersey Institute of Technology's
Electronic Theses & Dissertations Project

Title:	Fabrication of nanofiber scaffolds by electrospinning and it's potential for tissue engineering
Author:	Shanmugasundaram, Shobana
View Online:	njit-etd2004-069 (x, 74 pages ~ 6.0 MB pdf)
Department:	Department of Biomedical Engineering
Degree:	Master of Science
Program:	Biomedical Engineering
Document Type:	Thesis
Advisory Committee:	Jaffe, Michael (Committee chair) Arinzeh, Treena Livingston (Committee member) Collins, George (Committee member)
Date:	2004-05
Keywords:	Nanofiber scaffolds Electrospinning Tissue engineering
Availability:	Unrestricted
Abstract:	Electrospinning is a fabrication process that uses an electric field to control the deposition of polymer fibers on to a target substrate. This electrospinning strategy can be used to fabricate fibrous polymer mats composed of fiber diameters ranging from several microns down to tens of nanometers. This study assesses the potential of electrospinning, as an alternative scaffold fabrication technique for tissue engineering applications. In this study, electrospinning is adapted to produce tissue-engineering scaffolds of two different size ranges composed of non-woven poly-L-lactide (PLLA) nanofibers and as a first study, the potential use of these scaffolds as tissue engineering scaffolds was assessed with the cell proliferation of Mesenchymal stem cells. Electrospun fibers were characterized for fiber diameter, porosity, pore size and its distribution. The electrospun scaffolds achieved a high surface area and porosity. Mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) were seeded on to electrospun PLLA scaffolds having two different fiber diameters. The cell-polymer constructs were cultured under static culture conditions. Cell proliferation study was performed. The results showed that MSC tend to proliferate well on nanofibers than on microfibers.