Kaori Hayashi, Department of Bioengineering,won the SPSJ Annual Meeting Poster Award

Kaori Hayashi in the Department of Chemistry and Biotechnology, won a SPSJ Annual Meeting Poster Award.This award is given to the person made the excellent poster presentation at SPSJ Annual Meeting.

<About awarded research>

Injectable hydrogels, which are injected in solution state and form 3D networks in the body, attract much attention, because of its less invasiveness.  The following properties are required for injectable gels: (i) low swelling pressure so that the gels do not compress the surrounding tissue, (ii) rapid gelation ability to prohibit the pre-gel solution from flowing away.  Theoretically, hydrogels which are prepared in diluted region exhibit low swelling pressure.  However, gelation at low polymer concentration takes long time; it is impossible to realize these properties simultaneously in conventional polymer gels. In this study, we propose a new gel system using the clusters prepared near the gelation critical points.  As a result, we got hydrogels which have short gelation time and low simultaneously.

<Comments>

It is a great honor and pleasure for me to receive this award.  I sincerely appreciate Prof. Ung-il, Prof. Sakai and other Lab members.  I will earnestly do my research and get greater results in the future.