Novel injectable and in situ cross-linkable hydrogels of dextran methacrylate and scleroglucan derivatives: preparation and characterization.

In this paper mixtures of two biocompatible polymers, dextran methacrylate (DEX-MA) with different molecular weights and scleroglucan (Scl), in its native form and as carboxymethyl derivative (Scl-CM), were tested as injectable and in situ cross-linkable systems. Rheological and texture analyses were carried out to better investigate the behavior of this kind of matrices. The combination of these polymers is able to assure adequate mechanical properties, suitable for biomedical applications. In addition swelling studies and in vitro release studies of three different biomolecules were also carried out.