Integration of hydrogels in flow microfluidic devices: current development and applications

Hidrogeli so zamreženi, hidrofobni polimeri, ki absorbirajo in zadržijo veliko količino vode, hkrati pa ohranijo svojo strukturo. Hidrogel je definiran kot tridimenzionalna zamrežena polimerna mreža. Pri generaciji hidrogela iz raztopine sem poskušala pridobiti čim bolj homogen hidrogel. S spreminjanjem parametrov, in sicer gostoto električnega toka, pretok in čas depozicije sem optimizirala tako, da sem pridobila homogen hidrogel. Iz raztopin alginata in hitozana sem generirala hidrogel v pretočni mikrofluidni napravi. Pri generacija hidrogela iz raztopine alginata sem po različnih časih depozicije hidrogelu izmerila absorbanco, s katero sem določila koncentracijo železa v hidrogelu, ki se je absorbirala. Ugotovila sem, da se je s podaljšanjem časa depozicije v hidrogel absorbiralo več železa. Hitozan, raztopljen v ocetni kislini, ni bil homogen, zato temu hidrogelu nisem izmerila debeline. Iz raztopine hitozana, ki je bila pripravljena s HCl sem dobila dobre rezultate. Tako generiranemu gelu sem izmerila debelini nastalega hidrogela pod optičnim mikroskopom.Hydrogels are cross-linked, hydrophobic polymers, which can absorb and keep enormous amount of water and maintain their structure. Hydrogel is defined as three-dimensional cross-linked polymeric network. When I was generating hydrogel from solution, I tried to obtain as homogenous hydrogel as possible. By changing the parameters, electric density, flow rate and deposition time, I optimized it in order to obtain homogenous hydrogel. I generated hydrogel from alginate and chitosan solutions in a flow microfluidic device. When generating hydrogel from an alginate solution, I measured the absorbance after different times of deposition to the hydrogel, which was used to determine the iron concentration in the hydrogel that was absorbed. I found that by increasing time of deposition more iron was absorbed into the hydrogel. Chitosan dissolved in acetic acid was not homogenous, so I did not measure the thickness of this hydrogel. I got good results from the chitosan solution that was prepared with HCl. I measured the thickness of the hydrogel generated in this way under an optical microscope