Boronic Acid-Containing Microgels

As mentioned above, rapid swelling is a major advantage of microgels over bulky gels because of their reduced size. As Tanaka and Fillmore pointed out, the rate of gel swelling is dominated by the motion of the polymer network. For spherical gel particles, the characteristic swelling time (r ) is given by the equilibrium gel radius (Rgq) and the diffusion coefficient of the gel 

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FIGURE 9.31 Illustration of specific extraction of RNA using phenyl boronic acid containing thermally sensitive microgel particles. (From Elmas, B. et al., Colloid Surf. A Physicochem. Eng. Aspects, 232, 253, 2004.)... 

FIGURE 9.32 Schematic illustratiotr of specific immobilization of RNA onto phenyl boronic acid containing polyNIPAM microgels. (From Uguzdogan, E. et al., Macromol. Biosci., 2(5), 214, 2002.)... 

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