The esophagus is a tubular multi-layer organ
that carries the food bolus and liquids from the mouth to
the stomach. Esophageal prostheses and scaffolds should
have the appropriate mechanical and strain properties in
the longitudinal and circumferential directions. A novel
bi-layered esophageal prosthesis was produced using
knitted tubular silk fabric and a coating of polyurethane
(PU) nanofibers. The optimization process was performed
in two steps. First, 12 different tubular structures of knitted silk fabrics were produced and mechanical properties
were measured in both directions. The mechanical properties were optimized using an artificial neural network
(ANN) and a genetic algorithm (GA) and the optimum knitted structure was produced as a substrate for coating with
PU nanofibers. In second step, 20 different samples were
produced by electrospinning the PU nanofibers at different process conditions (collector speed, feeding rate) on
the optimized structure of the knitted fabric. Finally, the
elastic properties of the bi-layered tubular structures were
measured and optimized by the ANN and GA methods.
Results presented show that the optimized structure of the
esophageal prosthesis had proper mechanical properties
similar to the esophagus. Such a structure can be used as
a substitute in esophageal disorders.