“thanks to nanosheet-enhanced polymer entanglement.”
Explain that one to me.
Pressed flat they stick together...................
It looks like the innovation is really polymerization in an ionic liquid.
The polymer is a combination of two acrylics and the use of an ionic liquid allows the degree of polymerization to be very high.
Usually one adds a crosslinking molecule to make the polymer insoluble but apparently the high molecular weight makes this unnecessary.
It looks as though this is an organogel (solvent) and not a hydrogel (water) when you look at the original article in Science magazine. Poly(methyl methacrylate) and poly(ethyl methacrylate) are not soluble/swellable in water.
So if this is to be used in medicine the ionic liquid solvent would have to be biocompatible.
(I am currently conducting some experiments to make a hydrogel that dries very slowly by using hygroscopic, organic counterions instead of inorganic ones like Na+ and Ca+)