Despite its common use in cell culture studies, polyacrylamide gel's mechanical properties remain unclear. To characterize this gel fully, atomic force microscopy, uniaxial testing, rheology, and ball indentation were used. The range of the elastic moduli was 1.9-7.5 kPa and 18.1-39.4 kPa, for 5%/0.025% and 8%/0.08% gel concentrations, respectively, and a Poisson's ratio of 0.45 was found. Future research utilizing polyacrylamide as a cell culture substrate should indicate how the gel was characterized and acknowledge the uncertainty in stiffness values.

• This report represents the work of one or more WPI undergraduate students submitted to the faculty as evidence of completion of a degree requirement. WPI routinely publishes these reports on its website without editorial or peer review.

Creator

• Gautreau, Zachary R
• Griffin, Jeremy Ryan
• Peterson, Todd F.
• Thongpradit, Ploypan

Publisher

• Worcester Polytechnic Institute

Identifier

• E-project-042706-113033

Advisor

• Billiar, Kristen
• Burnham, Nancy A.

Year

• 2006

Date created

• 2006-04-27

Resource type

• Major Qualifying Project

Major

• Physics
• Biomedical Engineering

Rights statement

• In Copyright