Effect of electrospinning parameters on morphological properties of PVDF nanofibrous scaffolds

Smart materials like piezoelectric polymers represent a new class of promising scaffold in neural tissue engineering. In the current study, the fabrication processing parameters of polyvinylidine fluoride (PVDF) nanofibrous scaffold are found as a potential scaffold with nanoscale morphology and microscale alignment. Electrospinning technique with the ability to mimic the structure and function of an extracellular matrix is a preferable method to customize the scaffold features. PVDF nanofibrous scaffolds were successfully fabricated by the electrospinning technique. The influence of PVDF solution concentration and other processing parameters like applied voltage, tip-to-collector distance, feeding rate, collector speed and the solvent were studied. The optimal parameters were 30 w/v% PVDF concentration, 15 kV applied voltage, 18 cm tip-to-collector distance, 0.5 ml/h feeding rate, 2500 rpm collector speed and N,N′-dimethylacetamide/acetone as a solvent. The mean fiber diameter of the obtained scaffold was 352.9 ± 24 nm with uniform and aligned morphology. Finally, the cell viability and morphology of PC-12 cells on the optimum scaffold indicated the potential of PVDF nanofibrous scaffold for neural tissue engineering. © 2017, The Author(s).