Electrospinning repellents in polyvinyl alcohol-nanofibers for obtaining mosquito repelling fabrics

Recently, the use of repellents for preventing the transmission of mosquito-borne diseases is getting increasingly more attention. However, most of the current repellents are volatile in nature and must be frequently re-applied as their efficacy is only limited to a short period of time. Therefore, a slow release and abrasion resistant mechanism is needed for prolonging the protection time of these repellents. This study direct micro-encapsulation of repellents from an emulsion or integrating already encapsulated repellents into nanofibers via electrospinning. Different repellents were electrospun in polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) nanofibrous structures, namely p-menthane-3,8-diol (PMD) microcapsules, permethrin, chili and catnip oil. The repellents were successfully incorporated in the nanofibers and the tensile properties of the resulting samples did not have a significant change. This means that the newly created textiles will be identical to current PVA nanofibrous textiles with the added ...