Transport in fibrous materials and biomembranes

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Fibrous materials are suitable for applications involving transport, filtration, separation, absorption because they have large surface areas and highly porous structures. The development of nanofibrous materials exploits the advantages of the ultra-high surface areas of fibrous materials. Biomembranes made of nanofibres are potentially useful in many advanced application areas such as chemical or bio-defense, wound dressing, selective separation, immobilization of biologically or pharmacologically active agents and molecules, and scaffold for tissue engineering. These heterogeneous, anisotropic and compressible structures are versatile, yet challenging to researchers trying to control and optimize their properties for different applications. Up to now, an efficient and precise way to characterize the structure and the behavior of fluid transport in fibrous materials is still unavailable, but is essential for research in the field of material and biomedical sciences.       The proposed work will therefore focus on fundamental studies of fluid transport in fibrous structures and biomembranes, and will apply innovative multi-scale approaches to bridge the gap between our knowledge of the macroscopic transport behavior of fibrous materials, and our knowledge of the interaction among microscopic constituents of materials. To fulfill the research objectives, electrospinning equipment for nanofibre formation will be implemented; both macroscopic and microscopic techniques for characterizing surface and transport properties of fibrous materials will be used. The result of the proposed fundamental studies will provide groundwork in the development of fibrous materials or biomembranes for a wide variety of end uses, including absorption/adsorption, filtration, bio-separation, bio-defense, and membranes supporting smart materials, or tissue engineering. The proposed studies will lead to commercial and economic benefits: by developing high value-added products; the provincial and Canadian textile and material industry will enhance its competitiveness and increase its proportion of the textile market in technical sectors, contributing to the country's economic growth and job creation.