Pemble Oliver J, Bardosova Maria, Povey Ian M, Pemble Martyn E
Tyndall National Institute, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland.
School of Chemistry, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland.
Polymers (Basel). 2021 May 13;13(10):1566. doi: 10.3390/polym13101566.
Chitosan-based films have a diverse range of potential applications but are currently limited in terms of commercial use due to a lack of methods specifically designed to produce thin films in high volumes. To address this limitation directly, hydrogels prepared from chitosan, chitosan-tetraethoxy silane, also known as tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) and chitosan-glutaraldehyde have been used to prepare continuous thin films using a slot-die technique which is described in detail. By way of preliminary analysis of the resulting films for comparison purposes with films made by other methods, the mechanical strength of the films produced was assessed. It was found that as expected, the hybrid films made with TEOS and glutaraldehyde both show a higher yield strength than the films made with chitosan alone. In all cases, the mechanical properties of the films were found to compare very favorably with similar measurements reported in the literature. In order to assess the possible influence of the direction in which the hydrogel passes through the slot-die on the mechanical properties of the films, testing was performed on plain chitosan samples cut in a direction parallel to the direction of travel and perpendicular to this direction. It was found that there was no evidence of any mechanical anisotropy induced by the slot die process. The examples presented here serve to illustrate how the slot-die approach may be used to create high-volume, high-area chitosan-based films cheaply and rapidly. It is suggested that an approach of the type described here may facilitate the use of chitosan-based films for a wide range of important applications.
基于壳聚糖的薄膜有各种各样的潜在应用，但由于缺乏专门设计用于大量生产薄膜的方法，目前在商业用途方面受到限制。为了直接解决这一限制，由壳聚糖、壳聚糖 - 四乙氧基硅烷（也称为原硅酸四乙酯，TEOS）和壳聚糖 - 戊二醛制备的水凝胶已被用于使用详细描述的狭缝模头技术制备连续薄膜。作为对所得薄膜进行初步分析以便与通过其他方法制成的薄膜进行比较的方式，评估了所生产薄膜的机械强度。结果发现，正如预期的那样，由TEOS和戊二醛制成的混合薄膜均显示出比仅由壳聚糖制成的薄膜更高的屈服强度。在所有情况下，发现薄膜的机械性能与文献中报道的类似测量结果相比非常有利。为了评估水凝胶通过狭缝模头的方向对薄膜机械性能的可能影响，对沿与行进方向平行和垂直于该方向切割的纯壳聚糖样品进行了测试。结果发现，没有证据表明狭缝模头工艺会引起任何机械各向异性。这里给出的例子说明了如何使用狭缝模头方法廉价且快速地制造大量、大面积的基于壳聚糖的薄膜。建议这里描述的这种方法可能有助于将基于壳聚糖的薄膜用于广泛的重要应用。
