Photocrosslinked Chitosan Hydrogels Reinforced with Chitosan-Derived Nano-Graphene Oxide

Chitosan and chitosan-derived nano-graphene oxide carbon dots are successfully methacrylated and utilized for the fabrication of photocurable hydrogels. The addition of the nano-graphene oxide (nGO) does not significantly delay the polymer network build-up, but significantly reduces the storage modulus of the crosslinked network, with important detrimental effects on the mechanical performance. By replacing nGO with methacrylated M-nGO, the mechanical performance of the crosslinked polymer network is improved with an increase of the storage modulus as a function of increasing the M-nGO content in the photocurable formulation.