Environmentally responsive hydrogels have been applied in a wide variety of biological applications like control drug delivery of proteins.The intelligent response of these systems allows for a controlled release according to environmental triggers. In this context, pH-responsive hydrogels have been applied in numerous controlled-release applications (e.g. pH-responsive hydrogels composed of PEG-containing ionic networks have been applied for the oral delivery of proteins such as insulin).
In this work we present the synthesis of hydrogels based in a new acid dendritic monomer (MD1). Besides, their properties in a broad range of pH were examined and correlated to the crosslinking degree. The products presented different equilibrium swelling ratio and kinetic according the amount of crosslinking agent and the pH of swelling medium.
Furthermore, the hydrogels developed in this study exhibit pH responsive swelling and viscoelastic properties suggesting their potential for protein hosting and delivery applications.
