Functional hydrogels via click chemistry

Abstract

Hydrogels are three dimensionally crosslinked water soluble polymer networks which can absorb high quantity of water. In recent years, there has been a remarkable increase in the number of articles related to hydrogels due to their adjustable chemical and physical properties. As a consequence of the unique properties, hydrogels are widely used and waiting to be used in medical applications such as controlled drug release, cell growth media and tissue engineering, wound healing biological adhesives. For such applications attachment of desired molecules to the hydrogels are extremely important. Here, syntheses of functionalizable hydrogels by using dendron-polymer-dendron conjugates are successfully done and characterizations of molecules and post functionalization of hydrogels are reported. In this study, multivalency and mono dispersity properties of polyester dendrons are combined with the biocompatible, water soluble, polyethyleneglycol polymers by using [3+2] Huisgen type copper catalyzed cycloaddition chemistry to synthesize dendron–polymer conjugates. These copolymers are used to synthesize Functional hydrogels again by [3+2] Huisgen type “Click” reaction. Synthesized functional hydrogels are characterized with SEM and ATR FTIR and their high swelling properties are investigated. They are further functionalized covalently with a third “Click” reaction.