Casein-poly(methacrylic acid) hybrid soft networks with easy tunable properties

Abstract The design of complex polymeric materials with predefined task-specific properties meets challenging issues: to establish synthesis-structure-properties relationship, as well as to understand the arrangement and interactions of the involved components. Hybrid networks of protein (casein) and polyelectrolyte (poly(methacrylic acid)) were synthesized and their swelling, dynamic-mechanical and morphological properties were investigated as functions of the neutralization degree of methacrylic acid and the concentrations of caseinate and crosslinker. The domination of different interactions between components led to diverse forms of casein macromolecules- from micelles to unfold chains. That resulted in very different structures and thereby properties of derived hybrid networks: from porous unswellable to highly swellable and reinforced ones. A great opportunity to easily modulate the final characteristics of the reported hybrid system to fit the need of specific application just through the change of one synthesis parameter was thereby demonstrated.