@article {15707, title = {Green processing of chitin porous structures for biomedical aapplications combining ionic liquids and supercritical fluid technology}, journal = {Acta Biomaterialia}, volume = {7}, year = {2011}, month = {2011-07-15 00:00:00}, pages = {1166-1172}, publisher = {Elsevier}, abstract = {

The application of green chemistry principles in the processing of materials for advanced technologies is a steadily increasing field of research. In this work porous chitin-based materials were developed by combining the processing of\ chitin\ using\ ionic liquids\ (ILs) as a green solvent together with the use of\ supercritical\ fluid technology (SCF) as clean technology. Chitin was dissolved in 1-butyl-3-imidazolium acetate, followed by regeneration of the polymer in ethanol in specific moulds. The IL was removed using\ Soxhlet extraction\ and successive steps of extraction with SCF using carbon dioxide/ethanol ratios of 50/50 and 70/30. The developed porous chitin-based structures (ChIL) can be classified as\ mesoporous materials, with very low density and high porosity. The cytotoxicity of ChIL extracts was investigated using L929 fibroblast-like cells, and the results demonstrated that the produced materials have extremely low cytotoxicity levels. Therefore, the findings suggest that the porous chitin structures may be potential candidates for a number of biomedical applications, including tissue engineering.

}, keywords = {Biomaterials, BIOMEDICAL APPLICATIONS, chitin, ionic liquids, Supercritical drying}, issn = {1742-7061}, doi = {10.1016/j.actbio.2010.09.041}, url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1742706110004514}, author = {Silva, S. S. and Duarte, A. R. C. and Carvalho, A. P. B. and Mano, J. F. and Reis, R. L.} }