Ultrasound-responsive NIPAM-based hydrogels with tunable profile of controlled release of large molecules

Chueh-Hung Wu; Ming-Kuan Sun; Jay Shieh; Chuin-Shan Chen; Chang-Wei Huang; Chi-An Dai; Shu-Wei Chang; Wen-Shiang Chen; Tai-Horng Young

doi:10.1016/j.ultras.2017.03.019

Ultrasound-responsive NIPAM-based hydrogels with tunable profile of controlled release of large molecules

Ultrasonics. 2018 Feb:83:157-163. doi: 10.1016/j.ultras.2017.03.019. Epub 2017 Apr 2.

Authors

Chueh-Hung Wu¹, Ming-Kuan Sun², Jay Shieh³, Chuin-Shan Chen⁴, Chang-Wei Huang⁵, Chi-An Dai⁶, Shu-Wei Chang⁴, Wen-Shiang Chen⁷, Tai-Horng Young⁸

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Biomedical Engineering, College of Medicine and College of Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan; Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
² Institute of Biomedical Engineering and Nanomedicine, National Health Research Institutes, Miaoli, Taiwan.
³ Department of Materials Science and Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.
⁴ Department of Civil Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.
⁵ Department of Civil Engineering, Chung Yuan Christian University, Taoyuan, Taiwan.
⁶ Department of Chemical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan; Institute of Polymer Science and Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.
⁷ Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan; Institute of Biomedical Engineering and Nanomedicine, National Health Research Institutes, Miaoli, Taiwan; Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, National Taiwan University Hospital Hsin-Chu Branch, Hsinchu, Taiwan.
⁸ Institute of Biomedical Engineering, College of Medicine and College of Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan. Electronic address: thyoung@ntu.edu.tw.

PMID: 28408049
DOI: 10.1016/j.ultras.2017.03.019

Abstract

Episodic release of bioactive compounds plays an important role in biological systems. "On-demand" release systems which based on polymeric materials and activated by external stimuli may provide the necessary functionality. Here we describe an ultrasound-responsive hydrogel based on N-isopropylacrylamide (NIPAM) and N,N'-methylenebisacrylamide (MBAm), which is suitable for triggered release of two large molecules: bovine serum albumin (BSA, 66kDa) and dextran (3-5kDa). It is shown that the release amount of these two large molecules increased with increasing hydrogel temperature, and the application of ultrasound further increased the release. By simply adjusting the contents of NIPAM and MBAm, the difference of BSA release between the presence and absence of ultrasound could be adjusted from 2.7 to 84 folds. There was also a positive correlation between the ultrasound intensity and release amount. These properties made the NIPAM-based hydrogel a tunable platform for focal drug delivery.

Keywords: Controlled release; Hydrogel; Temperature dependence; Ultrasound.