Chitosan is naturally derived and has intriguing antibacterial, antimicrobial, polycationic, and film forming properties that provide a strong basis for materials development across many industries. However, the use of chitosan for most applications is limited due to batch-to-batch variability and its inherent brittleness. One approach to improving the versatility of chitosan-based materials is through the addition of fillers that can provide property improvements. Conflicting results have appeared in literature, and we attribute much of the discrepancies to lack of consistency in both the chitosan and the filler materials. In this work we demonstrate a new pathway to create synthetic models of chitosan using reversible addition fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) polymerization for use in future studies of chitosan filler interactions. Our models utilize copolymerization of methyl 6-methacryloyl-b-D-glucosaminoside to model the hydrophilic glucosamine units of chitosan and methyl methacrylate as the hydrophobic model of N-acetyl glucosamine. Copolymers were characterized using <sup>1</sup>H and <sup>13</sup>C NMR spectroscopy, DSC, and contact angle measurements.

Synthesis and characterization of glycopolymer copolymer mimics of chitosan

ACS Spring 2022

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.