Issue 25, 2016
From the journal:

Soft Matter

Effects of chain flexibility on the properties of DNA hydrogels

Wei Pan,a   Hao Wen,a   Lin Niu,a   Cuicui Su,a   Chenyang Liu,b   Jiang Zhao,b   Chengde Mao*c  and  Dehai Liang*a  

* Corresponding authors

a Beijing National Laboratory for Molecular Sciences and the Key Laboratory of Polymer Chemistry and Physics of Ministry of Education, College of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, Peking University, Bejing 100871, China
E-mail: dliang@pku.edu.cn

b Beijing National Laboratory for Molecular Sciences, Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China

c Department of Chemistry, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, USA
E-mail: mao@purdue.edu

Abstract

The effect of chain rigidity on the mechanic properties of DNA hydrogels was studied. Counterintuitively, the hydrogel formed by mainly flexible chains exhibited better stability, stretchability, and much mechanical properties than the hydrogel containing only rigid chains. Calculations showed that the crosslinking ratio in the hydrogel formed by flexible chains was about twice that of the hydrogel formed by rigid chains under the same conditions. We attributed this to the ease of conformational adjustment of flexible chains. Incorporation of 25% rigid chains further improved the performance of DNA hydrogel by shrinking the pore size and tuning its distribution.

Graphical abstract: Effects of chain flexibility on the properties of DNA hydrogels

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Article information

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1039/C6SM00283H
Article type
Paper
Submitted
02 Feb 2016
Accepted
19 Apr 2016
First published
21 Apr 2016

Soft Matter, 2016,12, 5537-5541

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Effects of chain flexibility on the properties of DNA hydrogels

W. Pan, H. Wen, L. Niu, C. Su, C. Liu, J. Zhao, C. Mao and D. Liang, Soft Matter, 2016, 12, 5537 DOI: 10.1039/C6SM00283H

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