Síntesis y caracterización de hidrogeles termosensibles conteniendo como agente de entrecruzamiento un silsesquioxano modificado

A. GALLASTEGUI; M. L. GOMEZ

Santa Fé

Congreso; XIII Congreso Internacional de Metalurgia y Materiales - IBEROMAT 2014; 2014

Universidad Nacional del Litoral

Hydrogels (cross-linked polymers capable of absorbing large amounts of water) are particularly suitable materials for pharmaceutical and biomedical applications due to their structure and swelling capacity. It is well known that the conformation of polymers governs its physical-chemical properties, so if conformational changes of certain polymers are externally and reversibly controlled, it is possible to temporarily change their physical properties. Certain hydrogels has the property to response to various stimuli such as pH, salinity, electric current, temperature and antigens. These make them highly attractive for various biomedical applications. In this work we synthesize hydrogels by photopolymerization using a functionalized silsesquioxane containing amine and acrylates groups, which acts as crosslinking agent and co-initiator, simultaneously. The hydrogels were synthesized by photopolymerization by visible light of 530 nm, incorporating safranin as sensitizer. The employed monomers were: Acrylamide (AA), 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate (HEMA) and N-isopropylacrylamide (NIPAM).In this way, different formulations of NIPAM-HEMA and AA-HEMA hydrogels were obtained. Various formulations were synthesized in order to study variation in their swelling properties at different temperatures. It was observed that is possible to control the swelling capability of these materials with small variations in the proportion of crosslinking agent and varying monomers ratio. Temperature also has a marked effect on the swelling ability of these materials. Results obtained permit to highlights the potential biomedical applications through the use of these materials as controlled release systems of pharmaceutical drugs, such as analgesics and broad spectrum antibiotics.