| Biocompatible hydrogels can be derived from materials that are naturally obtained, such as proteins or polysaccharides, or synthetic, such as poloxamers. In order to be classified as biocompatible, these water-swollen networks can not trigger a toxic response once introduced into a biological or physiological environment and, therefore, must be immunoneutral. Hyaluronic acid hydrogels can be great candidates for tissue engineering applications as long as the cross-linking chemistry and process does not affect the biocompatibility of the natural protein matrix. Thermoreversible hydrogels have the advantage of undergoing a sol/gel phase transition at specific temperatures. Thus, they are excellent candidates for biomedical applications such as drug delivery systems, wound healing coatings or cellular scaffolds. Although these hydrogels can be used in their natural form without further modification or chemical alteration, the original protein or polymer matrix is often strengthened by the use of a crosslinking agent to achieve a specific set of properties. In the case of gelatin fibril formation at low temperatures or the micellization of triblock copolymers in solution with temperature increase, the natural phase transition is modified when crosslinkers are introduced to alter the biohydrogels properties and, ultimately, disturb the system's equilibrium. By using spectroscopy techniques, rheology and cryo-imaging we investigated several biocompatible polymeric networks in their natural form as well as their engineered structures to better understand the mechanisms of gelation and artificial internal re-organization of the networks. Natural and synthetic biohydrogels were designed and their mechanical properties were characterized before imaging. Models that better describe the relationship between network configuration and resulting mechanical properties showed great agreement with experimental mesh size observations. Finally, a novel set of hybrid gels was developed and exhibited outstanding thermomechanical properties. |
