Related papers: Bioinspired polymer-incorporating self-lubricating…
Living tissues show an extraordinary adaptiveness to strain, which is crucial for their proper biological functioning. The physical origin of this mechanical behaviour has been widely investigated using reconstituted networks of collagen…
This study reports the fundamental investigation of a novel composite material consisting of MXene (Ti$_3$C$_2$T$_x$) and a stimulus-responsive hydrogel (Poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) - PNIPAAm). In contrast to previously reported integration…
The use of colloidal supported lipid bilayers (CSLBs) has recently been extended to create colloidal joints, that - in analogy to their macroscopic counterparts - can flexibly connect colloidal particles. These novel elements enable the…
From microactuators to biological tissues, non-porous materials with the ability to strongly expand when in contact with a solvent are ubiquitous. Consequently, the swelling of polymer systems such as hydrogel has received recently much…
Cartilage is a connective tissue that covers the surfaces of bones in joints and provides a smooth gliding surface for movement. It is characterized by specific biophysical properties that allow it to withstand compressive loads, distribute…
A polymer shell offers a unique opportunity to tailor structural and optical properties of optically functional nanoparticles and their ensembles. Here, we develop a process to coat Mie-resonant silicon nanospheres (Si NSs) with a…
Lipid lamellar hydrogels are rare soft fluids composed of a phospholipid lamellar phase instead of fibrillar networks. The mechanical properties of these materials are controlled by defects, induced by local accumulation of a polymer or…
Colloidal microgel particles such as poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PNIPAM) shrink reversibly in an aqueous medium due to the expulsion of water at a volume phase transition temperature, VPTT $\sim$33$^\circ$C. Romeo et al. [Adv. Mater. 2010,…
Recent surveys have shown that the number of nanoparticle-based formulations actually used at the clinical level is significantly lower than expected a decade ago. One reason for this is that the nanoparticle physicochemical properties fall…
We report on the poroelastic indentation response of hydrogel thin films geometrically confined within contacts with rigid spherical probes of radii in the millimeter range. Poly(PEGMA) (poly(ethylene glycol)) methyl ether methacrylate),…
We show that smoothing of multiaffine surfaces that are generated by simulating a crosslinked polymer gel by a frustrated, triangular network of springs of random equilibrium lengths [G.M. Buend{\'\i}a, S.J. Mitchell, P.A. Rikvold, Phys.…
Particle surface chemistry and internal softness are two fundamental parameters in governing the mechanical properties of dense colloidal suspensions, dictating structure and flow, therefore of interest from materials fabrication to…
We present results from extensive molecular dynamics simulations of collapse transitions of hydrophobic polymers in explicit water focused on understanding effects of lengthscale of the hydrophobic surface and of attractive interactions on…
Hyaluronan (HA) is among the most used biopolymers for viscosupplementation and cosmetic applications. However, the current injectable HA-based formulations present relevant limitations: I) unmodified HA is quickly degraded by endogenous…
Poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PNIPAM) is a temperature-responsive polymer that undergoes large volumetric deformations through a transition from a swollen to a collapsed state at the volume phase transition temperature (VPTT). Locally, these…
Micro- and nanogels are widely used to stabilise emulsions and simultaneously implement their responsiveness to the external stimuli. One of the factors that improves the emulsion stability is the nanogel softness. Here, we study how the…
Temperature-sensitive hydrogels based on polymers such as poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PNIPAM) undergo a volume phase transition in response to changes in temperature. During this transition, distinct changes in both thermal and mechanical…
When polyelectrolyte-neutral block copolymers are mixed in solutions to oppositely charged species (e.g. surfactant micelles, macromolecules, proteins etc), there is the formation of stable supermicellar aggregates combining both…
Microgel particles composed of Interpenetrated Polymer Networks (IPN) of poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) (PNIPAM) and poly(acrylic acid) (PAAc) dispersed in water have been investigated through dynamic light scattering. The study of the…
This paper presents FoamFactor, a novel material with tunable stiffness and compressibility between hydration states, and a tailored pipeline to design and fabricate artifacts consisting of it. This technique compounds hydrogel with…