Study on the Changes in Shielding Performance Based on Electrospinning Pattern Shapes in the Manufacturing Process of Polymer-Metal Composite Radiation Shielding Materials

Abstract

X-rays are commonly employed in medical institutions for diagnostic examinations, which often results in radiation exposure for both patients and medical personnel during treatments and procedures. Hands are typically the most exposed body parts, with scattered rays causing secondary exposure. To address this issue, a lightweight functional radiation protection fabric that guarantees the activity of medical personnel is required. In this study, a shielding fabric was fabricated with nanofibers using a mixture of tungsten and polyurethane to resolve the weight reduction problem of such nanofibers. To improve the shielding performance, the change in the performance arising from the spinning pattern in the nanofiber electrospinning manufacturing process was compared and tracked. The patterns reproduced via electrospinning included honeycomb, matrix-orthogonal, double-circle, and spider web patterns. Through this, a nanofiber fabric was produced, and the shielding performance was evaluated. The honeycomb pattern fabric exhibited the best shielding rate of 89.21% at an effective X-ray energy of 60.3 keV, and the double-circle pattern exhibited the lowest shielding rate of 62.55% at the same energy. Therefore, it was observed that the pattern arising from the nanofiber spinning conditions affects the dispersion of the shielding material, which affects the shielding performance. When 0.3 mm tungsten nanofiber fabric is compared with its lead equivalent of 0.25 mm, a difference of 8.7% was observed, suggesting that the nanofiber can be used in medical institutions. Future research will explore the potential of protective fabrics that minimally impact medical personnel’s mobility but provide enhanced protection against radiation exposure.