TY - JOUR
T1 - Arbitrarily-shaped microgels composed of chemically unmodified biopolymers
AU - Vakkipurath Kodakkadan, Yadu N.
AU - Idzakovicova, Kristyna
AU - Sepitka, Josef
AU - Ten Napel, Daniël
AU - Safai, Eric
AU - Cigler, Petr
AU - Štěpánek, Frantisek
AU - Rehor, Ivan
PY - 2020
Y1 - 2020
N2 - Biohydrogels, composed of naturally occurring biopolymers are typically preferred over their synthetic analogues in bioapplications thanks to their biocompatibility, bioactivity, mechanical or degradation properties. Shaping biohydrogels on the single-cell length scales (micrometers) is a key ability needed to create bioequivalent artificial cell/tissue constructs and cannot be achieved with current methods. This work introduces a method for photolithographic synthesis of arbitrarily shaped microgels composed purely of a biopolymer of choice. The biopolymer is mixed with a sacrificial photocrosslinkable polymer, and the mixture is photocrosslinked in a lithographic process, yielding anisotropic microgels with the biopolymer entrapped in the network. Subsequent ionic or covalent biopolymer crosslinking followed by template cleavage yields a microgel composed purely of a biopolymer with the 3D shape dictated by the photocrosslinking process. Method feasibility is demonstrated with two model polysaccharide biopolymers (alginate, chitosan) using suitable crosslinking methods. Next, alginate microgels were used as microtaggants on a pharmaceutical oral solid dose formulation to prevent its counterfeiting. Since the alginate is approved as an additive in the food and pharmaceutical industries, the presented tagging system can be implemented in practical use much easier than systems comprising synthetic polymers.
AB - Biohydrogels, composed of naturally occurring biopolymers are typically preferred over their synthetic analogues in bioapplications thanks to their biocompatibility, bioactivity, mechanical or degradation properties. Shaping biohydrogels on the single-cell length scales (micrometers) is a key ability needed to create bioequivalent artificial cell/tissue constructs and cannot be achieved with current methods. This work introduces a method for photolithographic synthesis of arbitrarily shaped microgels composed purely of a biopolymer of choice. The biopolymer is mixed with a sacrificial photocrosslinkable polymer, and the mixture is photocrosslinked in a lithographic process, yielding anisotropic microgels with the biopolymer entrapped in the network. Subsequent ionic or covalent biopolymer crosslinking followed by template cleavage yields a microgel composed purely of a biopolymer with the 3D shape dictated by the photocrosslinking process. Method feasibility is demonstrated with two model polysaccharide biopolymers (alginate, chitosan) using suitable crosslinking methods. Next, alginate microgels were used as microtaggants on a pharmaceutical oral solid dose formulation to prevent its counterfeiting. Since the alginate is approved as an additive in the food and pharmaceutical industries, the presented tagging system can be implemented in practical use much easier than systems comprising synthetic polymers.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85085904242&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1039/c9bm02056j
DO - 10.1039/c9bm02056j
M3 - Article
C2 - 32307470
AN - SCOPUS:85085904242
SN - 2047-4830
VL - 8
SP - 3044
EP - 3051
JO - Biomaterials Science
JF - Biomaterials Science
IS - 11
ER -