Modeling and characterization of glucose-sensitive hydrogel: Effect of Young's modulus

A multiphysics model concerning the diffusion and enzyme reaction simultaneously is developed in this paper to characterize the equilibrium behavior of the glucose-sensitive hydrogel, which is called the multi-effect-coupling glucose-stimulus (MECglu) model. The responsive behavior of the hydrogel in the chemo-electro-mechanical coupled energy domains is modeled by the nonlinear coupled partial differential equations. They include the Nernst–Planck equations for the diffusion of mobile species and the enzyme reaction catalyzed by the glucose oxidase and the catalase, the Poisson equation for electric potential, and the mechanical equilibrium equation for finite deformation of the glucose-oxidase-loaded pH-sensitive hydrogel. Numerical simulations demonstrate that the MECglu model can consist well with the published experiment for the practical physiological glucose concentration ranging from 0 to 16.5 mM (300 mg/ml). The effect of Young's modulus of the hydrogel is investigated on the distributive concentrations of reacting and diffusive species and the deformation of the glucose-sensitive hydrogels.