Shape-Encoded Chitosan–Polyacrylamide Hybrid Hydrogel Microparticles with Controlled Macroporous Structures via Replica Molding for Programmable Biomacromolecular Conjugation

• Published in: Langmuir 2016-05, Vol.32 (21), p.5394-5402
• Main Authors: Kang, Eunae, Jung, Sukwon, Abel, John H, Pine, Allison, Yi, Hyunmin
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Biological and Environmental Phenomena at the Interface
• ISSN: 0743-7463; 1520-5827
• DOI: 10.1021/acs.langmuir.5b04653

Polymeric hydrogel microparticle-based suspension arrays with shape-based encoding offer powerful alternatives to planar and bead-based arrays toward high throughput biosensing and medical diagnostics. We report a simple and robust micromolding technique for polyacrylamide- (PAAm-) based biopolymeric–synthetic hybrid microparticles with controlled 2D shapes containing a potent aminopolysaccharide chitosan as an efficient conjugation handle uniformly incorporated in PAAm matrix. A postfabrication conjugation approach utilizing amine-reactive chemistries on the chitosan shows stable incorporation and retained chemical reactivity of chitosan, readily tunable macroporous structures via simple addition of low content long-chain PEG porogens for improved conjugation capacity and kinetics, and one-pot biomacromolecular assembly via bioorthogonal click reactions with minimal nonspecific binding. We believe that the integrated fabrication-conjugation approach reported here could offer promising routes to programmable manufacture of hydrogel microparticle-based biomacromolecular conjugation and biofunctionalization platforms for a large range of applications.