Understanding of hydrogel network formation and its application in the architecture of significantly enhanced hydrogel

作者：Xiong J Y; Liu X Y^*; Li J L; Narayanan J; Wang R Y

来源：Applied Physics Letters, 2006, 89(8): 083106.

DOI：10.1063/1.2338007

An understanding of the physical hydrogel network formation has been obtained by dynamic rheological experiments. The evidence shows that the network formation turns out to be a nucleation-controlled process. It was found that there exists a critical temperature T-c; fiber branching is greatly enhanced when the network formation is performed in the regime of T < T-c (T, the final setting temperature). This finding enables the authors to build significantly enhanced gel networks. So far G(') (elastic modulus) of the hydrogel network has been enhanced by 187% while the formation period can be greatly shortened to only 1/20 of the previous process.

• 出版日期2006-8-21