Although prior groups have been successful at incorporating hyaluronic acid into a gel platform through random crosslinking events, yielding a gel which is biologically friendly these gel systems are often brittle and weak and would have difficulty performing in mechanically demanding environments. This hydrogel system possesses high mechanical robustness while allowing for an easy incorporation of glycosaminoglycans by trapping them in the primary hydrogel network through methacrylate mediated crosslinking. This system may expand the use of these glycosaminoglycan incorporated hydrogels into an arena of mechanically demanding environments such as soft tissue replacements and tissue engineering scaffolds.
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