Manipulating the properties of coacervated polyelectrolyte microcapsules by chemical crosslinking

The properties of coacervated sodium poly(styrene sulfonate) (PSS)/poly(allylamine hydrochloride) (PAH) microcapsules were manipulated by glutaraldehyde crosslinking at mild conditions. Although the crosslinking took place only between the PAH component, only 10% of PSS was lost from the 2-h crosslinked microcapsules. Significant variation in terms of capsule morphology, diameter, and wall thickness was not found by scanning electron microscopy and scanning force microscopy. Although all the microcapsules were not affected by annealing at 70 °C and incubation in 0.1 M HCl for 2 h, the crosslinked microcapsules indeed showed strong ability to resist osmotic-induced capsule invagination. Also, the 20-min and 2-h crosslinked capsule walls have elasticity modulii of 166 and 200 MPa, respectively, which are both larger than that of the original one (140 MPa). The crosslinked microcapsules also showed good stability in 0.01 M NaOH solution and poorer permeability for a large fluorescent probe.