A Novel Nanocomposite Hydrogel with Precisely Tunable UCST and LCST. Issue 5 (22nd January 2015)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Xia, Mengge; Cheng, Yanhua; Meng, Zhouqi; Jiang, Xiaoze; Chen, Zhigang; Theato, Patrick; Zhu, Meifang
• Is Part Of: Macromolecular rapid communications. Volume 36:Issue 5(2015:Mar.)
• Page Start: 477
• Page End: 482
• Publication Date: 2015-01-22
• Subjects: Macromolecules -- Periodicals; Polymers -- Periodicals; Chemistry -- Periodicals; 547.705
• DOI: 10.1002/marc.201400665
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1022-1336

Abstract

<abstract abstract-type="main" xml:lang="en"> <title> <x xml:space="preserve">Abstract</x> </title> <p>Novel thermosensitive nanocomposite (NC) hydrogels consisting of organic/inorganic networks are prepared via in situ free radical polymerization of 2‐(2‐methoxyethoxy) ethyl methacrylate (MEO₂MA) and oligo(ethylene glycol) methacrylate (OEGMA) in the presence of inorganic cross‐linker clay in aqueous solution. The obtained clay/P(MEO₂MA<italic>‐co‐</italic>OEGMA) hydrogels exhibit double volume phase transition temperatures, an upper critical solution temperature (UCST), and a lower critical solution temperature (LCST), which can be controlled between 5 and 85 °C by varying the fraction of OEGMA units and the weight percentage of cross‐linker clay. These new types of NC hydrogels with excellent reversible thermosensitivity are promising for temperature‐sensitive applications such as smart optical switches. <boxed-text content-type="graphic" position="anchor" orientation="portrait"><graphic position="anchor" mimetype="image" xlink:href="ark:/27927/pgj433812g" orientation="portrait" xlink:type="simple" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" /></boxed-text></p> </abstract>