Hydrogels represent a very interesting material for the immobilization of biocatalysts based on entrapment in their porous structure. The suitability of hydrogels for this purpose is determined by their properties, such as permeability to the substrate or product, pore size and mechanical properties (elastic or Young's modulus). In our research, we wanted to increase the permeability of hydrogels to hydrophobic molecules by using eutectic solvents in their preparation. We measured the permeability to ethyl acetoacetate and the rheological properties of hydrogels with added amounts of eutectic solvents. Based on the rheological properties, we estimated the pore size and Young's modulus. We found that the addition of 20 % of the eutectic solvent to the mixture for the preparation of the hydrogel increases the volume of the resulting hydrogel and subsequently also its permeability to ethyl acetoacetate, while decreasing the Young's modulus.
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