Studies on properties of electrospinning nanofibers of biodegradable tercopolymers derived from ɛ-CL, TMC and LLA

Scanning electron microscopy (SEM), diffraction scanning calorimetry (DSC), and X-ray diffraction (XRD) techniques were employed to characterize nanofiber structure and morphology. The properties of nanofibers including the mechanical property and the thermal behavior, especially biodegradability, were investigated. Due to stretching and molecular chain orientation in electrospinning process, the Tg, Tm and Wc of the nanofibers were higher than that of the corresponding tercopolymers. The Tg, Tm and Wc of the nanofibers decreased with increasing TMC content in copolymers. The mechanical properties of nanofibers changed with the different feed molar ratio. The degree of degradation of nanofibers was faster than that of the corresponding copolymers. In addition, the degradation behavior of nanofibers also altered with the different feed molar ratio. The data obtained would provide more details for application of tercopolymer nanofibers in biomedical field.