Abstract
The aim of this study was to develop new soft contact lens (SCL) materials which would, after recommended and existing machining processes, improve surface roughness. Nanomaterials (fullerene, fullerol and methformin hydroxylate fullerene) were incorporated into commercial material for SCL (SL38) based on PHEMA, which were derived by the technology in the production lab of the company Soleko (Milan, Italy). Nanophotonic SCLs (SL38-A, SL38-B, SL38-C, respectively) were produced in the company Optix (Belgrade, Serbia) from the obtained materials. For the surface characterization of SCLs, AFM analysis and lacunarity method were performed. The results showed that for the SL38-B average roughness value is lower than those of SL38-A and SL38. The topography parameters of SL38-C were between the parameters of SL38-A and SL38-B. Lacunarity analysis of AFM images confirmed that SCLs surface state should belong to either group of adequate (slanted p-diagram) or inadequate (contorted p-diagram) roughness concerning tear film stability. Nanophotonic SCL SL38-C exibits more acceptable performance considering SCL surface functional behavior as compared to other SCLs. The positive result of incorporating nanomaterials into basic material for SCL is better quality of the nanophotonic SCLs surfaces. On the bases of these experiments, the assumption that incorporation of fullerene derivate will not increase surface roughness parameters is confirmed.
Highlights
Hydrogels, three-dimensional hydrophilic polymeric networks capable of absorbing large amounts of water or biological fluids, enable high hydrophilicity and biocompatibility due to peculiar network structure
Hydrogels based on 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate (HEMA) copolymers are of a great interest because of their tunable chemical composition, hydrolytic stability, their excellent biocompatibility and physicochemical properties similar to those of living tissues [5,6,7]. 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate was the original hydrophilic lens monomer and nowadays continues to be the most commonly used hydrophilic monomer for soft contact lenses [8,9]
Topography measurements were routinely conducted for the basic (SL38) and new nanophotonic soft contact lenses (SL38-A, SL38-B, SL38-C) in tapping mode using uniform scanning surface of 10 × 10 μm
Summary
Three-dimensional hydrophilic polymeric networks capable of absorbing large amounts of water or biological fluids, enable high hydrophilicity and biocompatibility due to peculiar network structure. Many common hydrogels such as poly (2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate) (PHEMA), poly (ethylene glycol) (PEG) or poly (vinyl alcohol) (PVA) have found wide use both in laboratory studies and clinical uses. Hydrogels based on 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate (HEMA) copolymers are of a great interest because of their tunable chemical composition, hydrolytic stability, their excellent biocompatibility and physicochemical properties similar to those of living tissues [5,6,7]. There have been attempts to combine the ease of processability of polymers with excellent properties associated with the buckyball [16] since the report of the synthesis of a C60-pxylylene copolymer [17] has been published
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