Gelling agents are required for formulating both solid and semisolid media, vital for the isolation of microorganisms. Gelatin was the first gelling agent to be discovered but it soon paved the way for agar, which has far superior material qualities. Source depletion, issues with polymerase-chain-reaction and inability to sustain extermophiles etc., necessitate the need of other gelling agents....

Surface modification of neural prosthetic electrodes with polymeric materials, in particular, conducting polymers and hydrogels, has the potential to circumvent many problems associated with currently used electrode platforms. These problems include the disparity in mechanical properties between implanted electrodes and host neural tissue and the lack of biofunctionality at the electrode surfac...

It is common knowledge that the ocular bioavailability and therapeutic response of drugs applied topically as eye drops is very poor, this is due to rapid precorneal drainage of the instilled dose, which could be overcome by the use of in-situ gelling systems that undergo a sol-gel transition in the cul-de-sac. This work describes the ophthalmic formulation of an antibacterial agent ofloxacin, ...

The relatively weak mechanical properties of hydrogels remain a major drawback for their application as load-bearing tissue scaffolds. Previously, we developed cell-laden double-network (DN) hydrogels that were composed of photocrosslinkable gellan gum (GG) and gelatin. Further research into the materials as tissue scaffolds determined that the strength of the DN hydrogels decreased when they w...

In this Article, the compound '(R)-(–)-2-phenylpropionic acid' was incorrectly given as '(R)-(–)-2-methylphenylpropionic acid'. In the Results section under subheading 'Interference of the tropolone biosyn-thetic pathway of B. plantarii by PAA analogues' , " Among the PAA analogues tested, p-tolylacetic acid, (R)-(–)-2-methylphenylpropionic acid, and (p-isopropylphenyl)acetic acid inhibited tro...