2018 March - 24 articles
Various apparently inconsistent experimental observations have been reported on the effects of electric charges on the volume phase transition of thermosensitive gels. A simple method of interpretating these results is presented.
Investigating the solvent transport behaviour of edible gels is important because it is strongly related to flavour release. We previously reported the solvent transport behaviour of mechanically-constrained agarose gels. These studies clearly showed...
The effect of monomer sequence along the network chain on the swelling behavior of polymer gels should be clarified for the advanced control of swelling properties of gel materials. To this end, we systematically investigated the swelling properties...
Hydrogels based on reversible covalent bonds represent an attractive topic for research at both academic and industrial level. While the concept of reversible covalent bonds dates back a few decades, novel developments continue to appear in the gener...
The study of the coupling between the conformational properties of a polyelectrolyte chain and the distribution of counter-ions surrounding the chain is important in developing predictive theories for more complex polymer materials, such as polyelect...
Gels are amorphous solids whose macroscopic viscoelastic response derives from constraints in the material that serve to localize the constituent molecules or particles about their average positions in space. These constraints may either be local in...
We describe the creation of hollow tubular hydrogels in which different zones along the length of the tube are composed of different gels. Our method to create these gels is adapted from a technique developed previously in our lab for creating solid...
We describe the formation of structured liquids and gels from a functionalised dipeptide based on tetraphenylethylene. Tetraphenylethylene is well-known to be able to undergo aggregation-induced emission. We use the emission data to understand the be...
Biomineralization has been given a great deal of attention by materials chemists because of its low environmental load and sustainability. With the goal of synthesizing such processes, various methods have been developed, especially for inorganic sal...
We demonstrate experimentally that a phase-separating host solvent can be used to organize colloidal rods into different cluster and network states. The rods are silica sphero-cylinders which are preferentially wet by the water-rich phase of an oil–w...
Stimuli-responsive, smart, intelligent, or environmentally sensitive polymers respond to changes in external stimuli such as pH, temperature, ionic strength, surfactants, pressure, light, biomolecules, and magnetic field. These materials are develope...
This review presents and critically evaluates recent advances in non-conventional gelation method of native alginate. A special focus is given to the following three methods: cryotropic gelation, non-solvent induced phase separation and carbon dioxid...
Due to their broad range of porosity, aerogels are suited to various applications. The advantages of a broad range of porosity are used directly, for example, in thermal and acoustic insulation, as materials for space applications or in catalysers. H...
Complexation between anionic and cationic polyelectrolytes results in solid-like precipitates or liquid-like coacervate depending on the added salt in the aqueous medium. However, the boundary between these polymer-rich phases is quite broad and the...
The preparation of inorganic, organic and/or hybrid nanostructured materials with controlled shape and size is crucial for the development of nanotechnology, and it is nowadays the focus of intense research.[...]
Polyelectrolyte gels are useful as carriers of proteins and other biomacromolecules in, e.g., drug delivery. The rational design of such systems requires knowledge about how the binding and release are affected by electrostatic and hydrophobic intera...
Dispersion of graphite in water was achieved using clay as dispersing aid. In the absence of polymer, the clay/graphite suspensions were sufficiently stable to produce aerogels composed of very thin layers of uniformly dispersed nanoparticles. Poly(v...
Despite intense recent interest in weakly bound nonlinear (“exponential”) multilayers, the underlying structure-property relationships of these films are still poorly understood. This study explores the effect of time used for deposition of individua...
Peer review is an essential part in the publication process, ensuring that Gels maintains high quality standards for its published papers[...]
Silica Aerogel composites are ultra-low density, highly porous foam-like materials that exhibit excellent thermal insulation and high strain recovery characteristics. In the present work, environment-friendly silica aerogel composites are fabricated...
We report here studies of swelling, mechanics, and thermal stability of hydrogels consisting of 20 mol % methacrylamidophenylboronic acid (MPBA) and 80 mol % acrylamide (AAm), lightly crosslinked with methylenebisacrylamide (Bis). Swelling was measur...
Supercritical drying of gels is considered as the most important step of aerogel production since it enables preservation of the three-dimensional pore structure which lead to unique material properties such as high porosity, low density, and large s...
We investigate the chemical equilibria of weak polyelectrolyte nanogels with reaction ensemble Monte Carlo simulations. With this method, the chemical identity of the nanogel monomers can change between neutral or charged following the acid-base equi...
The potential applications of self-assembled supramolecular gels based on natural molecules encouraged the researchers to develop a versatile synthetic method for their structural analogues. Herein, we report a facile synthesis of glycolipid from ren...
