Engineering Commons^™

Development Of In Situ Forming Hydrogels For Intra-Articular Drug Delivery, Andy Prince

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Hydrogels are 3-dimensional crosslinked polymer networks that can absorb significant amounts of water. The physical properties associated with hydrogels affords them resemblance to biological tissues making them good candidates for biomedical applications. Many pharmaceuticals, specifically non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), have poor aqueous solubility, which limits their bioavailability and efficacy. People suffering from chronic osteoarthritis (OA) are required to frequently take large doses to mitigate pain, which can lead to serious side effects. Hydrogels are good strategies to deliver NSAIDs via articular injection because they can form solid gels in situ. This thesis describes the synthesis, formulation, mechanical testing, in …

Ph Responsive Hydrogen Bonding Motif To Improve The Sensitivity Of Tumor Imaging, Fatimah Mohammed Algarni

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is a powerful non-invasive medical diagnostic technique. Superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIO) are effective contrast agents and provide high sensitivity contrast in MRI. Recent research has demonstrated that nanoparticle clusters exhibit significantly higher relaxivity than individual nanoparticles.

In order to increase the sensitivity of tumor imaging, supramolecular chemistry was introduced to this field and a novel conjugation method was developed using click chemistry between azide functionalized nanoparticles and pH-sensitive hydrogen bonding building blocks. This pH-sensitive hydrogen bonded complex was synthesized to cluster nanoparticles under mildly acidic biological conditions.

Due to the unexpected X-ray crystal structure of …