Glycerol-modified poly(vinyl alcohol)/poly(ethylene glycol) self-healing hydrogel for artificial cartilage |
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Authors: | Zishuo Ye Hailin Lu Guiquan Chai Changlei Wu Jian Chen Leifeng Lv |
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Affiliation: | 1. Group of Mechanical and Biomedical Engineering, College of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering, Xi'an Polytechnic University, Xi'an, China;2. Department of Orthopadics, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an, China |
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Abstract: | Poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) hydrogels have shown potential applications in bionic articular cartilage due to their tissue-like viscoelasticity, good biocompatibility and low friction. However, their lack of adequate mechanical properties is a key obstacle for PVA hydrogels to replace natural cartilage. In this study, poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) and glycerol were introduced into PVA, and a PVA/PEG–glycerol composite hydrogel was synthesized using a mixing physical crosslinking method. The mechanical properties, hydrophilicity and tribological behavior of the PVA/PEG–glycerol hydrogel were investigated by changing the concentration of glycerol in PEG. The results showed that the tensile strength of the hydrogel reached 26.6 MPa at 270% elongation at break with 20 wt% of glycerol plasticizer, which satisfied the demand of natural cartilage. In addition, the excellent hydrophilicity of glycerol provides good lubricating properties for the composite gel under dry friction. Meanwhile, self-healing and cellular immunity assays demonstrated that the composite gel could have good self-healing ability and excellent biocompatibility even in the absence of external stimuli. This study provides a new candidate material for the design of articular cartilage, which has the potential to facilitate advances in artificial joint cartilage repair. © 2022 Society of Industrial Chemistry. |
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Keywords: | poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) glycerol poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) artificial cartilage self-healing |
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