Articles techniques et présentations

The pH-sensitive hydrogels are responsive to the pH of surrounding solution, which often resemble to biomaterials. Recently, pH-sensitive hydrogels are widely used in various devices as sensing media. We present the simulation of swelling characteristic of 3D-arbitarary-geometry, pH-sensitive hydrogel in steady state conditions.

Three nonlinear partial-differential equations that are representing responsible physical phenomena namely- chemical, electrical and mechanical can describe the swelling responses to a chemical change in surrounding solution. Finite element analysis used for present study was carried out by full coupling of above three partial-differential equations with variable material properties in COMSOL Multiphysics®. Employing a moving mesh method for 3D geometry, the FEM simulation was performed to account for large-swelling of the pH-sensitive hydrogel.