Mesoscopic Structure of Mucin-Mimicking Hydrogels

Biological hydrogels such as mucus, found at surfaces in the human body, act as a protective barrier against pathogens. In this experiment, we aim to develop a thorough understanding of how the rheological properties of mucin-mimicking hydrogels are related to their mesoscopic structure. For two different model hydrogel systems, we will systematically vary polymer chain length, concentration, pH and salt concentration, which yields a broad range of viscoelastic behaviour. Using SANS, we want to establish a connection to the associated structural changes on the mesoscopic scale. From the resulting spectra, we will be able to extract important hydrogel parameters such as mesh size and the fractal dimension of the polymer network. These parameters are required as input for a detailed theoretical description of the hydrogels based on bottom-up modelling techniques.