Biocompatible thermoresponsive polyurethane bionanocomposites with chitin nanocrystals

Abstract

In this work, different thermoresponsive biobased polyurethane (PU) bionanocomposites with chitin nanocrystals (CHNCs) are prepared. The behavior of the biobased PU used as matrix differs from common polyurethanes, since hard segment is constituted by the macrodiol and soft segment by a biobased diisocyanate and chain extender. The effect of CHNC content on shape-memory behavior is studied. It is observed that CHNCs tend to interact with diisocyanate/chain extender rich domain. In addition, an increase of the overall crystallinity of the material is also observed. Therefore, the addition of CHNCs contributes to the shape recovery of the bionanocomposites, as well as to shape fixity at high CHNC content. Finally, the cytotoxicity, hemocompatibility, and cell adhesion analysis reveals that the prepared bionanocomposites show potential to be used in biomedical applications. © 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2019, 136, 47430.