Spectroscopy, swelling and temperature kinetics of an injectable hydrogels based on lactones and acrylamides

• Grant number: 15/20933-7
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Doctorate
• Start date: April 15, 2016
• End date: April 14, 2017
• Field of knowledge: Engineering - Materials and Metallurgical Engineering - Nonmetallic Materials
• Principal Investigator: Eliana Aparecida de Rezende Duek
• Grantee: Daniel Vinícius Mistura
• Supervisor: Lhocine Yahia
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Engenharia Mecânica (FEM). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: École Polytechnique de Montréal, Canada
• Associated to the scholarship: 14/12428-8 - Synthesis and characterization of a new class of injectables, termosensitives and biodegradables hydrogels as substrate for cell differentiation, BP.DR

Abstract

The class of hydrogels has been developed since past years, mainly the injectable materials. These types of materials showed thermoresponsive temperatures near human body conditions (37ºC) named LCST - Low Critical Solution Temperature. The primary challenge of this hydrogels is tunable mechanical properties and biodegradability of these materials in vitro for posterior use in vivo. The primary objective of this internship is characterizing the swelling properties of nine different hydrogel syntheses with distinctive monomers composition, indicating the capability of the hydrogel to swell in solutions. In addition, evaluate the temperature kinetics by thermogravimetric analysis, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) to evaluate the functional groups in the material surface and the composition of material to verify the influence of acrylic acid groups in hydrophilicity, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with low vacuum to analyze the surface of swelling material and Time-of-Flight Sims (TOF-SIMS) to evaluate the chemical components of the copolymers. The final aim of this Project is to optimize the hydrogel characteristics in comparison with another synthesis.