Figure 3.

Molecular dynamic simulations of ProGel-Dex in water at 4°C and 30°C. Six ProGel-Dex polymer molecules are colored as yellow, blue, dark green, bright green, magenta, and pale colors. The Dex molecules are colored in orange. The size of the six-molecule system was 59 Å × 62 Å × 71 Å at 4°C and 52 Å × 61 Å × 40 Å at 30°C, respectively. This suggests that the ProGel-Dex polymer chains simulated at higher temperature (30°C) adopts a more interconnected conformation with aggregation of the hydrophobic Dex molecules (orange color) from different polymer chains, leading to the formation of a more compact conformation. At lower temperature (4°C), however, the aggregation of the hydrophobic Dex (orange color) appeared to be reduced, resulting in less intermolecular entanglement of the simulated ProGel-Dex polymer chains and a more extended conformation.