Fabrication of well-aligned PPV/PVP nanofibers by electrospinning

The electrospinning of poly(p-phenylene vinylene) (PPV) polyelectrolyte precursor/poly(vinyl pyrrolidone) (PVP) blends with different composition ratios was performed with ethanol as a spinning solvent. The PPV precursor/PVP blends with the weight ratio of 20/80 could be electrospun into uniaxially aligned nanofibers. However, pure PPV precursor was not able to be electrospun into well-aligned nanofibers due to the polyelectrolyte nature. After thermal conversion, these nanofibers were converted into PPV/PVP nanofibers. The optical property of the PPV/PVP nanofibers was characterized by PL spectroscopy. The PL spectrum of PPV/PVP nanofibers exhibited a blue shift relative to PPV nanofibers.