Independent and Synergistic Modulations of Viscoelasticity and Stiffness of Dynamically Cross-Linked Cell-Encapsulating ClickGels by Covalently Tethered Polymer Brushes
UMass Chan Affiliations
Department of Orthopedics and Physical RehabilitationDocument Type
Journal ArticlePublication Date
2021-08-09Keywords
StressStiffness
Encapsulation
Nucleic acid structure
Hydrogels
Biomaterials
Materials Chemistry
Molecular, Cellular, and Tissue Engineering
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
We report independent and synergistic modulations of the stiffness and viscoelasticity of ClickGels, formed by a combination of the bio-orthogonal covalent and dynamic noncovalent cross-linking, by covalently incorporating nonionic, zwitterionic, or anionic polymer brushes. Tethering nonionic and zwitterionic brushes at the cost of noncovalent cross-linking increased stiffness and slowed stress relaxation, respectively, without altering the other properties. Meanwhile, tethering anionic brushes significantly increased ClickGel stiffness, while also slowing its stress relaxation. ClickGels with faster stress relaxation, not reduced stiffness, promoted short-term (24 h) viability and YAP/TAZ nuclear localization of encapsulated bone marrow-derived stromal cells (BMSCs). In contrast, ClickGel stiffness, not viscoelasticity, inversely correlated to the short-term dehydrogenase activity of encapsulated BMSCs. This work highlights the role of the ionic state of polymer brushes in modulating the hydrogel elastic modulus and viscoelasticity and establishes the brush-modified ClickGel as a facile and reproducible tool for manipulating mechanical cues of the synthetic cellular niche.Source
Tan Y, Song J. Independent and Synergistic Modulations of Viscoelasticity and Stiffness of Dynamically Cross-Linked Cell-Encapsulating ClickGels by Covalently Tethered Polymer Brushes. Biomacromolecules. 2021 Aug 9;22(8):3408-3415. doi: 10.1021/acs.biomac.1c00477. Epub 2021 Jul 22. PMID: 34292720. Link to article on publisher's site
DOI
10.1021/acs.biomac.1c00477Permanent Link to this Item
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14038/29910PubMed ID
34292720Related Resources
ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1021/acs.biomac.1c00477