Antimicrobial Poly(lactic acid)-Based Nanofibres Developed by Solution Blow Spinning

The present study reports on the development of hybrid poly(lactic acid) (PLA) fibres loaded with highly crystalline bacterial cellulose nanowhiskers (BCNW) by the novel solution blow spinning method. Furthermore, fibres with antimicrobial properties were generated by incorporating carvacrol and THC as antimicrobial agents and the biocide effect against Listeria monocytogenes was studied. Initially, PLA blow spun fibres containing BCNW were optimized in terms of morphology and thermal properties. The addition of BCNW was seen to significantly increase the viscosity and surface tension of solutions, restricting the capacity to form fibres for concentrations greater than 30 wt.-% BCNW. 15 wt.-% BCNW was selected as the optimum nanofiller loading as it led to the most uniform fibres morphology, with BCNW homogeneously distributed along the fibres' axis. Subsequently, carvacrol and THC were incorporated into the fibres to confer them with antimicrobial properties, although the hydrophobic PLA matrix did not provide an efficient release of the antimicrobials. Thus, hydrophilic substances were added in order to trigger the antimicrobials release through water sorption mechanisms. The addition of the BCNW filler was not seen to significantly increase the antimicrobial capacity of the fibres by itself and, hence, gelatin was added to help promoting further the hydrophylicity and biocide performance of the fibres. Nevertheless, for the more hydrophilic THC, the biocide capacity of the fibres with gelatin was accentuated further by the presence of the BCNW.