Publication detail

Mechanical Properties of Agarose Hydrogels Tuned by Amphiphilic Structures

KADLEC, M. PEKAŘ, M. SMILEK, J.

Original Title

Type

journal article in Web of Science

Language

English

Original Abstract

Agarose is a biocompatible polysaccharide which is able to form physically cross-linked hydrogels in aqueous dispersion. These materials offer a wide range of applications and are commonly used in the food industry or electrophoresis. Moreover, due to their suitable properties (biocompatibility, high water absorption, porosity), agarose hydrogels have recently also found applications also in drug delivery systems, wound dressing, and extracellular matrix (ECM) modelling. In this paper, a comprehensive rheological characterization of agarose hydrogels with various self-assembled amphiphilic structures (CTAB, TTAB, SDS, Tween 20) acting as simple membrane structure models was performed. The results showed that the presence of surfactants of diverse charge above their critical micellar concentration (CMC) can enhance hydrogel mechanical properties. Moreover, pronounced enhancement was observed for cationic surfactant, and even concentrations below CMC resulted in a higher stiffness of the hydrogel. Therefore, both the electrostatic effect and the amphiphilic structure effect can have a significant impact on the rheological properties on agarose hydrogels. These findings are of a great interest in the field of polymer and surfactants interactions, since agarose is widely considered essentially uncharged. However, it is assumed, that traces of negatively charged groups on the agarose backbone can have a significant impact when interacting with oppositely charged surfactants. Moreover, these findings could be beneficial for better understanding of interaction of polysaccharides (e.g. agarose) and self-assembled amphiphilic structures and can also be considered as a crude model of ECM in which membrane structures are embedded.

Keywords

Agarose; hydrogel; surfactant; rheology; stress relaxation

Authors

KADLEC, M.; PEKAŘ, M.; SMILEK, J.

Released

11. 7. 2024

Publisher

Elsevier

Location

Amsterdam, Nizozemsko

ISBN

0927-7757

Periodical

Colloids and Surfaces A: Physicochemical and Engineering Aspects

Year of study

700

Number

State

Kingdom of the Netherlands

Pages count

URL

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0927775724016558

BibTex

@article{BUT189041,
  author="Martin {Kadlec} and Miloslav {Pekař} and Jiří {Smilek}",
  title="Mechanical Properties of Agarose Hydrogels Tuned by Amphiphilic Structures",
  journal="Colloids and Surfaces A: Physicochemical and Engineering Aspects",
  year="2024",
  volume="700",
  number="1",
  pages="14",
  doi="10.1016/j.colsurfa.2024.134791",
  issn="0927-7757",
  url="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0927775724016558"
}