Smart Polymers and their Applications: A Review

Abstract

Smart polymers are materials that respond to small external stimuli. These are also referred as stimuli responsive materials or intelligent materials. Smart polymers that can exhibit stimuli-sensitive properties are becoming important in many commercial applications. These polymers can change shape, strength and pore size based on external factors such as temperature, pH and stress. The stimuli include salt, UV irradiation, temperature, pH, magnetic or electric field, ionic factors etc. Smart polymers are very promising applicants in drug delivery, tissue engineering, cell culture, gene carriers, textile engineering, oil recovery, radioactive wastage and protein purification. The study is focused on the entire features of smart polymers and their most recent and relevant applications. Water soluble polymers with tunable lower critical solution temperature (LCST) are of increasing interest for biological applications such as cell patterning, smart drug release, DNA sequencing etc.