Nano-sized Hydrogel Capturing Nitrogen Monoxide
Nano-sized Hydrogel Capturing Nitrogen Monoxide
  • Reporter Song Sung-chan
  • 승인 2019.06.13 13:26
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▲Prof. Kim Won-jong (CHEM)
▲Prof. Kim Won-jong (CHEM)

Nitrogen monoxide is a double-edged sword. Just enough of it will prevent blood pressure elevation and occluded artery, but once too much of it is accumulated, it causes inflammatory diseases such as lupus, Crohn disease, and rheumatism.
Professor Kim Won-jong (CHEM) at POSTECH and his research team has created a Nano-sized hydrogel that effectively captures nitrogen monoxide inside a body utilizing a cross linking agent that reacts to nitrogen monoxide. Prof. Kim’s team has been focusing on rheumatoid arthritis, which is occurs because of an excessive formation of nitrogen monoxide inside the body, and has concocted a macro-sized hydrogel that reacts to nitrogen monoxide in 2017. But the team did not stop there and has successfully developed a Nano-sized hydrogel.
The Nano-sized hydrogel is created from polymerization of acrylamide, a unimolecular compound, and NOCCL, a cross linker. Such hydrogel has advantages over the previously used restrainer, which worked by forcing gene or enzymes to interact with the restrainer, in that it reduced the side effect by simply capturing the nitrogen monoxide and in that it can be used in various other diseases than rheumatoid arthritis.
The achievement of Prof. Kim was announced by Nano Letters, an international nanoscience journal.