from the conferences organized by TANGER Ltd.
Cation active chitosan was studied as the active substance incorporated into an inert hydrogel to affect its transport and barrier properties. The inert hydrogel was based on thermo-reversible agarose which can be prepared in defined shape and size required for the mathematical description of studied transport. Amido Black 10B was chosen as a model anionic dye able to interact with chitosan. Agarose hydrogels with the contents of chitosan equal to 2, 5, and 10 µg per gram of hydrogel were prepared. Diffusion experiments were realized at three different temperatures (30, 40, and 50 °C).Transport experiments in hydrogels provided the values of effective diffusion coefficients involving the effect of interactions between chitosan and dye under given conditions. The incorporation of chitosan into inert hydrogel resulted in the decrease in the dye diffusivity. An apparent equilibrium constant as the ratio between immobilized and free movable dye particles was determined on the basis of the comparison of dye diffusivities in hydrogels enriched by chitosan with values obtained for pure agarose hydrogel. The increase in temperature enhanced diffusion rate as expected. The increase in diffusion coefficients with increasing temperature showed on the predominant influence of higher mobility in comparison with temperature dependence of reaction rate.
Keywords: Chitosan, dye, hydrogel, applications, testing methods© This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.