Chitosan Hydrogels Covalently Crosslinked with a Natural Reagent

Abstract

Abstract Chitosan hydrogels were synthesized by crosslinking them with genipin at different concentrations. The time required for obtaining the hydrogel and their physico-chemical properties, such as rheological analysis, stability at different pH's and water absorption capacity were studied as a function of the genipin concentration. The morphology was determined by scanning electron microscopy on freeze-dried hydrogels. The results revealed that low genipin concentration allowed to obtain well crosslinked hydrogels and indicated that the genipin concentration influenced the physico-chemical properties studied. Moreover, the results showed that the swelling percentage of chitosan hydrogels depends highly on the crosslinking degree and on the medium pH.