Polymer Gels, Softcover reprint of the original 1st ed. 1991 Fundamentals and Biomedical Applications

This volume contains a series of papers originally presented at the Symposium on Polymer Gels organized and sponsored by the Research Group on Polymer Gels,The Society of Polymer Science of Japan and co-sponsored by the Science and Technology Agency (ST A) and MIT!, Japan. The Symposium took place at Tsukuba Science City on 18th and 19th September, 1989. Recognized experts in their fields were invited to speak and there was a strong attendance from government, academic and industrial research centers. The purpose of the Symposium was to review the state of the art and to present and discuss recent progress in the understanding of the behavioral properties of polymer gels and their application to biomedical, environmental and robotic fields. Most of the papers and related discussions concentrated on the swelling behavior of hydrogels and chemomechanical systems, both artificial and naturally occurring, in which external stimuli of a physical or chemical nature control energy transformation or signal transduction. The recent great interest in chemomechanical systems based on polymer gels has stimulated considerable effort towards the development of new sensors and actuators, controllable membrane separation processes, and delivery systems in which the functions of sensing, processing and actuation are all built into the polymeric network device. Artificial chemomechanical systems, through the use of environmentally sensitive polymer gels, are emerging as interesting materials for mimicking basic processes previously only confined to the biological world, and commercially viable applications are also foreseen in the not-too-distant future.

Fundamentals.- Characterization of Gel Structure by Means of SAXS and SANS.- Physical Gelation of Synthetic and Biological Macromolecules.- Effects of Shear Modulus of Polymer Gels.- Interaction between Solvent Molecules and Networks in Biogels -Viscoelasticity, Strength.- Synthesis and Properties of Inorganic/Organic Hybrid Gels by the Sol-Gel Process.- Biologicals.- Excitation Process and Swelling of Nerve Fibers.- Cytoskeletons Are Functionally Differentiated in the Squid Giant Axon.- Synthetic Vitreous Body of PVA Hydrogel.- Immobilization of Bioactive Substances with PVA Supports.- Electric Modulation of Polymer Gel Contraction and Animal Cell Proliferation.- Separation.- Separation of Organic Solvent/Water Mixtures by Acrylamide Gel Membrane Supported by Silica-Alumina Porous Membrane.- Permeation Mechanism for a Thermo-Sensitive Switching-Functional Composite Membrane of Porous Glass and Hydrogel.- Gel Dewatering Process for Biological Slurry.- Sensors and Actuators.- A Polymer Composite Showing Electrocontractile Response.- Conversion of Chemical into Mechanical Energy by Synthetic Polymer Gels (Chemomechanical System).- Amphoteric Polyvinyl Alcohol Hydrogel and Electrohydrodynamic Control Method for Artificial Muscles.- Deformation Behaviors of Polymer Gels in Electric Field.- Thermoresponsive Polymer Hydrogel.- Contraction Behavior of Poly(acrylonitrile) Gel Fibers.- Measuring Contact Stress with 19F-NMR Spectroscopy.- Drug Delivery System.- Conventional and Environmentally-Sensitive Hydrogels for Medical and Industrial Uses.- Thermo-Responsive Polymeric Hydrogels and Their Application to Pulsatile Drug Release.- Hydrophobic Weak Polybasic Gels: Factors Controling Swelling Equilibria.- Diffusion-Reaction through Coated Gel Containing Enzyme Effects of Asymmetry and Sol-Gel Transition.