| Abstract Scope |
Chitin is one of the abundant biological macromolecules, which is composed of N-acetyl-D-glucosamine repeating units. Although chitin exhibits biocompatibility and biodegradability, leading to its expectation in biomedical applications, it is mostly unutilized as practical materials due to its quite poor feasibility and processability. Chitosan, which is obtained by N-deacetylation of chitin, has been used as biomedical materials, because of its better processability than chitin, owing to dissolving in acidic aqueous media. Nanofibrillation of native chitin sources is identified as an efficient functional materialization approach, such as the fabrication of chitin nanofibers (ChNFs). For example, self-assembled ChNFs are obtained by regenerative bottom-up approach from chitin/ionic liquid gels (ion gels). 3D-polysaccharides, that is, network polysaccharides, are also fabricated from low-molecular weight chitosan, called water-soluble chitosan, by crosslinking with an oligosaccharide crosslinker. The products formed chitosan-based nanogels. The above chitin/chitosan-based materials can be expected as bio-based functional candidates for biomedical applications. |