Layer-by-Layer Assembly for Surface Tethering of Thin-Hydrogel Films: Design Strategies and Applications

Manipulation and engineering of the surfaces has a key role in improving the materials properties. Anchoring of thin hydrogels on the materials surface is one of the recently developed methods to achieve surfaces with high potential applications. Layer-by-layer (LBL) has been used widely as a strong strategy for immobilization of thin hydrogel films on the surface of various organic/inorganic substrates. Electrostatic LBL and covalent LBL are two main strategies used in this regard. In electrostatic LBL, negatively and positively hydrophilic polymers are sequentially assembled to create a multilayer hydrogel which subsequent covalent crosslinking of multilayers improved the stability of the inserted layers. On the other hand, covalent LBL requires hydrophilic polymers bearing reactive telechelic groups. These reactive polymers are prepared by various polymerization techniques or by post-functionalization of biopolymers. The principles of hydrogel anchoring have described along with representative examples. Besides, the potential applications of the modified surfaces in specific cases have been addressed and overviewed.