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Updated: Aug 6, 2026
Preparation of Complaint Matrices for Quantifying Cellular Contraction
Published on: December 15, 2010
Swelling-induced modulation of static and dynamic fluctuations in polyacrylamide gels observed by scanning
Hidemitsu Furukawa1, Kazuyuki Horie, Ryunosuke Nozaki
1Department of Organic and Polymer Materials Chemistry, Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, 2-24-16 Naka-cho, Koganei-shi, Tokyo 184-8588, Japan. hfurukaw@cc.tuat.ac.jp
Abstract:
The nature of inhomogeneities in vinylpolymer gels has hardly been clarified yet. Inhomogeneities on submicron and nanometer scales in polyacrylamide gels have been investigated by using a scanning microscopic light-scattering system and applying a general formula for an ensemble-averaged correlation function. The network structure of the gels is modified by varying the preparation conditions and can be roughly divided into two types. Swelling-induced modulation of inhomogeneities depends on the type of the network structure. At low monomer concentrations in preparation, both submicron- and nanometer-scale inhomogeneities increase with swelling. At high monomer concentrations in preparation, submicron-scale inhomogeneities increase with swelling, but nanometer-scale inhomogeneities decrease anomalously. This behavior is explained by a model of inhomogeneous network structure of vinylpolymer gels, where macrogel is formed from a large number of microgel particles.
