TY - JOUR

T1 - Monitoring of multiple fabrication parameters of electrospun polymer fibers using mueller matrix analysis

AU - Sharma, Gaurav

AU - Jütte, Lennart

AU - Gopani, Jigar

AU - Brehme, Jules

AU - Günther, Axel

AU - Sindelar, Ralf

AU - Renz, Franz

AU - Roth, Bernhard

N1 - Funding Information: This work was supported by iToBoS (Intelligent Total Body Scanner for Early Detection of Melanoma), a project funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, under Grant Agreement No 965221. The financial support by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under Germany’s Excellence Strategy within the Cluster of Excellence PhoenixD (EXC 2122, Project ID 390833453) is acknowledged.

PY - 2024/3/12

Y1 - 2024/3/12

N2 - Electrospun polymer fiber mats feature versatile applications in tissue engineering, drug delivery, water treatment and chemical processes. The orientation of fibers within these mats is a crucial factor that significantly influences their properties and performance. However, the analysis of fiber samples using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) has limitations such as time consumption, fixed assembly, and restricted field of vision. Therefore, a fast and reliable method for qualitative measurements of fiber orientation is required. Mueller matrix polarimetry, a well-established method for measuring orientation of chemical and biological species, was employed in this case. We investigated the effect of four important parameters of the electrospinning process, namely collector speed, applied voltage, needle-to-collector distance, and solution concentration, on fiber orientation using Mueller matrix polarimetry thus extending the range of parameters analyzed. Measurements were performed using two extreme values and a central optimized value for each fabrication parameter. Changes in matrix values were observed for each fabrication parameter, and their correlation with fiber orientation was analyzed based on the Lu-Chipman decomposition. The results were compared with SEM images, which served as the ground truth, and showed overall good agreement. In the future, the analysis of electrospun polymer fibers can be done by using Mueller matrix polarimetry as alternative to current technology and fabrication parameters, including solution concentration for the first time in this context and the production can quickly be adjusted based on the outcome of the measurements.

AB - Electrospun polymer fiber mats feature versatile applications in tissue engineering, drug delivery, water treatment and chemical processes. The orientation of fibers within these mats is a crucial factor that significantly influences their properties and performance. However, the analysis of fiber samples using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) has limitations such as time consumption, fixed assembly, and restricted field of vision. Therefore, a fast and reliable method for qualitative measurements of fiber orientation is required. Mueller matrix polarimetry, a well-established method for measuring orientation of chemical and biological species, was employed in this case. We investigated the effect of four important parameters of the electrospinning process, namely collector speed, applied voltage, needle-to-collector distance, and solution concentration, on fiber orientation using Mueller matrix polarimetry thus extending the range of parameters analyzed. Measurements were performed using two extreme values and a central optimized value for each fabrication parameter. Changes in matrix values were observed for each fabrication parameter, and their correlation with fiber orientation was analyzed based on the Lu-Chipman decomposition. The results were compared with SEM images, which served as the ground truth, and showed overall good agreement. In the future, the analysis of electrospun polymer fibers can be done by using Mueller matrix polarimetry as alternative to current technology and fabrication parameters, including solution concentration for the first time in this context and the production can quickly be adjusted based on the outcome of the measurements.

KW - electrospinning

KW - Mueller matrix

KW - polarization

KW - polymer fibers

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85187549504&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1088/2040-8986/ad2ca4

DO - 10.1088/2040-8986/ad2ca4

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85187549504

VL - 26

JO - Journal of Optics (United Kingdom)

JF - Journal of Optics (United Kingdom)

SN - 2040-8978

IS - 4

M1 - 045404

ER -