Jet deposition in near-field electrospinning of patterned polycaprolactone and sugar-polycaprolactone core–shell fibres

In this work, the effects of process parameters on the deposition of single component and compound core–shell jets in near-field electrospinning are reported. It is shown that the working distance and fibre collector speed have a more significant influence on the deposition of a single jet than the flow rate. In the case of a compound jet, it is shown that jet deposition onto aluminium foil results in a linear fibre form, but on glass slides it appears as a random fibre network. The fabrication of aligned and patterned core–shell structured fibres is demonstrated by coaxial electrospinning of sugar and polycaprolactone (PCL) solutions. Aligned sugar-PCL core–shell fibres with diameters of ∼1.2 μm are deposited on an x–y translation stage, 10 cm below the coaxial spinneret. Complex patterns of sugar-PCL core–shell fibres with average diameters ranging from 72 to 175 μm are fabricated by reducing the working distance to 2 cm.