Gels, additional research needs

How Might You Contribute The properties of gel-based materials need to be studied and categorized. In addition, new types of gels with possibly even more startling properties remain to be formulated. The performance of these materials is another area of intense research. For example, the response time of artificial muscle must be very short for the material to function in a natural manner. Natural muscle contracts within 100 ms of receiving the instruction from the brain, which is faster than most responsive gels can perform. 

The explosion of literature in the field of sol-gel science in the past decade made it difficult for newcomers to catch up to the state of the art and overwhelmed researchers already involved in the subject. The book by Brinker and Scherer (8) and the chapter by Brinker (Chapter 18) fill the need for a coherent account of the principles of sol-gel processing. Additional detailed discussions on this subject are included in the section on sol-gel technology in this book, in the collection of articles edited by Klein (72), and in the Proceedings of the Materials Research Society (79-81) and the Ultrastructure Processing meetings (82-84). 

Contamination Problems. As analytical techniques become more sensitive, contamination becomes more of a problem. For example, Ochs (25) reported that many erroneous bands in polyacrylamide gels run with SDS were from proteins found on the skin of the researchers handling the gels. Her work indicates the need to exercise extreme care in sample preparation. In addition, suitable sample blanks handled in a parallel fashion would enable the researcher to identify contamination problems. Secondary checking of materials by two-dimensional electrophoresis would also help identify the nature and type of contamination. 

These many new forms have afforded researchers with vehicles to have improved chemistries and to offer multiple benefits. Additionally, for added convenience, many of the product types can be purchased in unit dose form. Unitized doses of dishwashing detergents are more attractive because they alleviate the need for precise dosing and avoid wasteful overdosing. Packaging materials have been developed such that one dose could have several layers or compartments that break down and dissolve over the wash or with specific triggers. " Sharma et al., for example, discuss a multicomponent pouch that can deliver a powder form on one side and liquid/gel form on the other side. Some of these newer product forms with their reported benefits can be seen in Figure 3.8. 

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