β-Chitin nanofibrils for self-sustaining hydrogels preparation via hydrothermal treatment

A transparent nanofibril suspension could be readily obtained by treating purified squid pen powder in water with ultrasonic irradiation. The obtained suspension is consisted of β-chitin nanofibrils (CNF) with 3–10 nm in width and several micrometers in length. The degree of acetylation (DA) of CNF was found to be 84% which is about 10% lower than that of untreated sample. The CNF suspension could be transformed into a durable 3-D hydrogels (CH) by simply heating to 180 °C for 1–4 h in an autoclave. Hydrophobic interaction between CNF was believed to play the major role for CNF self-assembling into hydrogels, since the as-prepared chitin hydrogels readily dissolved in a typical chaotropic solution (8 M urea) under room temperature. The hydrothermal duration and CNF concentration (0.3–2% (w/v)) strongly affected the physical properties of CH. The suspension of 1% (w/v) CNF treated with 4 h, 180 °C hydrothermal heating generated a CH with 99.3% water content, CNF with 87% crystallinity and an mechanical strength of 0.7 N breaking force.