One-step fabrication of multi-scaled, inter-connected hierarchical fibrous membranes for directional moisture transport

Hypothesis: Functional textiles engineered for maintaining body comfort by fast sweat release using the directional moisture transport concept are in high demand. However, designing these functional textiles remains a critical job and generally requires multi-step complex fabrication routes. In this regard, developing one-step strategy to fabricate multi-scaled, inter-connected nonwoven-nanofiber/nets hierarchical fibrous composite membranes with asymmetric wettability for enhanced directional moisture transport would be a very fruitful approach. Experiment: Composite membranes were fabricated by the rational combination of commercial polyethylene terephthalate nonwoven (CNW) as hydrophobic layer, and polyamide and silver nanoparticles (PA-Ag) nanofiber/nets as hydrophilic layer via one-step electrospinning process. Findings: The resultant CNW/PA-Ag nanofiber/net composite membranes were carefully investigated for water vapor transport, moisture management performance, and antibacterial activity. The subsequent membranes not only exhibit exceptionally high one-way moisture transport index (1253%), considerably high water vapor transport rate (11.45 Kg m(-2)d(-)(1)), and overall moisture management capacity (0.91), but also offer high resistance of 16.9 cm H2O to prohibit the moisture drive in the opposite way, and considerable antibacterial activity against Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus. The effective one-step fabrication of such fascinating directional moisture transport membranes with decent antibacterial activity opens a new intuition into the designing of novel functional materials for rapid sweat release and personal drying applications. (C) 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.