Modeling of melt electrospinning for semi-crystalline polymers

A comprehensive model for the stable jet region in electrospinning of crystallizing polymer melts has been presented. First, the conventional flow-induced crystallization (FIC) model by Ziabicki was coupled with the non-isothermal melt electrospinning model. The modeled initial jet profiles were compared to digitized experimental images of the stable Nylon-6 melt jet near the spinneret. The final jet diameters were also compared to the average thickness of collected fibers. The results were in good agreement with the flow visualization experiments for various melt temperatures and flow rates. The modeled crystallinity predictions were also in agreement with experimental data from collected fiber mats. Then, a new FIC model that can provide microstructure information, such as crystallite number density and average size, has been proposed and validated under isothermal and non-isothermal conditions in the bulk as well as in the confined geometry of the polymer melt jet in electrospinning. Nylon-6,6 was used as the model polymer in this crystallization study, and the results are in good agreement with the widely-used Ziabicki FIC model.