Preparation of Hydrogel Based on Acryl Amide and Investigation of Different Factors Affecting Rate and Amount of Absorbed Water
- 1 Chemical Engineering Department, The British University in Egypt, BUE, Cairo, Egypt
- 2 Chemical Engineering Department, The British University in Egypt, BUE, Cairo, Egypt
- 3 Chemical Engineering Department, The British University in Egypt, BUE, Cairo, Egypt
Abstract
Hydrogel is considered as an important material in our world nowadays as it is used in many important and significant applications such as in tissue engineering and agriculture. There are hundreds of types of such materials, where most of them can be easily prepared. The main objective of this work is to prepare one of the hydrogel types which could be very useful in the agriculture of deserts where plants in dry places require water in order to grow up. There are many places around the world where raining occurs only once or twice a year. There are also places where it does not rain at all. Therefore, hydrogels are required in order to absorb water in large quantities either during raining or irrigation instead of escaping to underground and then eject them to the roots of plants over time as the plants require watering. In this research a hydrogel based on acryl amide, Poly 2-Acrylamide-2-Methyl-1-Propane Sulphonic Acid, (PAMPS) was prepared by using different percentages of a suitable cross-linking agent, Methylene-bis-Acrylamide. The cross-linker content is very important factor affects the rate and amount of absorbed water. The highest amount of absorbed water at 25°C was observed by using 0.6% cross-linking agent based on monomer mass. The temperature of absorbed water and its pH value are also essential factors that affect the rate and the amount of absorbed water and were investigated in this work. The highest amount of absorbed water was recorded at pH = 12 and at 60°C. The amount and the rate of water absorbed by Sodium Polyacrylate Hydrogel were also investigated at 25°C. The agriculture applications of hydrogel based on Sodium Polyacrylate were examined using Fenugreek seeds implanting.
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