Hydrogels: A Journey from Diapers to Gene Delivery

Title:Hydrogels: A Journey from Diapers to Gene Delivery

Volume: 14 Issue: 2

Author(s): Pooja Chawla, Alok Ranjan Srivastava, Priyanka Pandey and Viney Chawla

Affiliation:

Keywords: Biomaterials, Dental Adhesives, Diet aid, Gastric Retention, Hydrogels, Intelligent Gels, Smart Gels, Tissue Engineering.

Abstract: Hydrogels are the biomaterials comprising network of natural or synthetic polymers capable of absorbing large amount of water. Hydrogels are “Smart Gels” or “Intelligent Gels” which can be made to respond to the various environmental conditions like temperature, pH, magnetic/electric field, ionic strength, inflammation, external stress etc. There are numerous potential applications of hydrogels in modern day life ranging from a diaper to gene delivery. This review succinctly describes the classification, properties and preparation methods along with numerous diverse applications of hydrogels like agricultural hydrogels, hydrogel for drug delivery, sensing, dental adhesives, wound healing and tissue regeneration, diet aid and gastric retention and in tissue engineering etc. Hydrogels can be regarded as highly valuable biomaterials for human-beings.

Cite this article as:

Chawla Pooja, Srivastava Ranjan Alok, Pandey Priyanka and Chawla Viney, Hydrogels: A Journey from Diapers to Gene Delivery, Mini-Reviews in Medicinal Chemistry 2014; 14 (2) . https://dx.doi.org/10.2174/1389557513666140103110243