The Development of Electrospinning Technologies for Commercial Application

In common with most technological advances, electrospinning was not devised in a few years as the result of direction provided by the clear demands from business to the research community. Scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs worked independently towards the general, and sometimes overlapping, aims of advancing knowledge and making money. The work undertaken by these savants and industrialists provided both theoretical and practical underpinnings for the process. At the end of the nineteenth century, both the technological ingredients (high-voltage power supplies and soluble polymers) and the commercial drivers (the potential of the emerging artificial fibres industry) were in place to allow the invention of the process to take place. Currently, there are at least 18 countries with practicing electrospinning companies. The machine market sectors addressed by these companies vary in scope from the manufacture of laboratory-scale machines aimed at the research market through to full-scale production lines. The materials market sectors range from small-volume high-cost medical materials to the commodity materials for filtration and cosmetic use. To examine the current state of technological play we provide a sample of companies currently either making electrospinning machines or electrospun products.