Silver-incorporated poly vinylidene fluoride nanofibers for bacterial filtration

An anti-bacterial filter was developed using poly vinylidene fluoride (PVDF) nanofibers using electrospinning method blended with silver nanoparticles (AgNO 3 ) of varying weight percentages of filler. Polypropylene (PP) non-woven substrate was used as base material for collecting the nanofibers. It also acted as a barrier to protect the fibers. UV-visible spectroscopy and fourier transform infra red spectroscopy confirmed the uniform dispersion of silver nanoparticles throughout the nanofibers. The experiment was designed using Box-Behnken statistical tool through three different variables namely, PP non-woven sheets (GSM), electrospinning time (hours), concentration of silver (wt%) in 15 runs. Surface morphology was analyzed using scanning electron microscopy and atomic force microscopy. Thermogravimetric analysis was performed for the analyses of mass decomposition of the material. Bacterial filtration efficiency and anti-bacterial activity studies were tested against Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli for both PVDF + 0 wt% Ag fibers and PVDF-Ag nanofibers. This research shows the bacterial filtration efficiency for the prepared PVDF-Ag nanofibers as 99.86%. The prepared nanofilter was shown providing greater possibilities towards the application for clean air management. © Copyright 2019 American Association for Aerosol Research