Synthesis and rheological characterization of a novel thermostable quick setting composite hydrogel of gellan and pullulan.

Hydrogels have found applications in diverse industrial sectors and majority of them are chemically modified. However, recently demand for stable biocompatible non-toxic hydrogels has increased significantly. The current study is focused on synthesizing a novel composite hydrogel using gellan and pullulan, two commercially available biologically safe polysaccharides, without any chemical modifications. Furthermore, rheological behavior of the gellan-pullulan hydrogel was studied and power law and Arrhenius models were fit to understand consistency and flow behavior. Interestingly, this novel hydrogel was quick-setting and exhibited good crosslinking and maintained its elasticity at high temperature and frequency. Overall analysis of the rheological data suggested that the synthesized hydrogel can offer potential advantages over gellan hydrogel as it was found to be more thermostable and elastic. This is the first report of a composite hydrogel solely made of gellan and pullulan.