Langmuir, Vol.26, No.4, 2831-2838, 2010
Impregnation of Tubular Self-Assemblies into Dextran Hydrogels
Amine groups are the building units of proteins. The incorporation of amine groups into polyethylene glycol diacrylate (PEGDA) hydrogel through dextran-allyl isocyanate-ethylamine (Dex-AE) enhances Sustained protein release by introducing effective interactions. To investigate such an interaction effect and to improve protein release, we impregnated self-assembled tubular structures from dextran-bromoethylamine (Dcx-BH) and dextran-chloroacetic acid (Dex-CA) into Dex-AE/PEGDA hydrogel. The morphology data obtained from scanning electron microscopy (SEM) reveal that pure PEGDA hydrogel had no effect on the distribution of the self-assembled tubules; the introduction of Dex-AE brought about the dispersion of these tubules, and an increase in Dex-AE content led to more evenly distributed structures. Moreover, the implantation of the self-assembled tubules had no distinct effect on the swelling capacity of the hybrid self-assembly embedded hydrogels. The in vitro albumin release Study was carried out in a pH 7.4 buffer solution; the results show that the implantation of the self-assembly into the hydrogels reduced the burst release and prolonged the protein release time. These findings demonstrate that the impregnation Of tubular self-assembly into hydrogel makes the hybrid hydrogel all excellent protein delivery system.