Fabrication of Aligned Poly(Lactic Acid)-Chitosan Nanofibers by Novel Parallel Blade Collector Method for Skin Tissue Engineering

Poly(lactic acid) (PLA) was blended with chitosan (CS) to fabricate electrospun aligned PLA-CS nanofibers. These prepared nanofibers were aligned using a novel collector made of parallel blades which is designed to increase the transversal electric field across the gap. SEM images show that the fiber diameter mostly ranges between 150 +/- 60 nm and Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) analysis confirm the presence of PLA and CS. X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) studies explains the amorphous nature of electrospun PLA-CS nanofibers, suitable for faster degradation. Degradation studies confirmed that PLA-CS nanofiber has enhanced degradation than the pure PLA fibers. Cell studies with human dermal fibroblasts (HDF) show the orientation of cells along the direction of fiber alignment. The results indicate that the prepared PLA-CS aligned nanofibers are promising material for skin tissue engineering.