N,N,N-trimethyl chitosan (TMC) with 93% degree of trimethylation was synthesized. TMC and the chitosan starting material were subjected to acidic hydrolysis to produce 49 different samples with a reduced average molecular weight (M_w) ranging from 2 to 144 kDa. This was done to allow the investigation of the relationship between antibacterial activity and M_w over a wide M_w range. NMR investigation showed that hydrolysis did not affect the degree of trimethylation (DS_TRI) or the structure of the polymer backbone. The activity of TMC against Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) increased sharply with M_w until a certain M_w value (critical M_w for high activity, CMW) was reached. After the CMW, the activity was not affected by a further increase in the M_w. A similar pattern of activity was observed for chitosan. The CMW was determined to be 20 kDa for TMC and 50 kDa for chitosan.

The paper presents a method of depositing N,N,N-trimethyl chitosan (TMC) layers onto polypropylene and polylactide nonwovens. A two-step modification procedure is applied: first, grafting the nonwovens with acrylic acid and next layer-by-layer deposition. Turbidimetric measurements confirm the creation of polycomplexes between grafted poly(acrylic acid) and deposited TMC. The created material structure is evaluated using gravimetric analysis, reflectance Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive spectroscopy measurements and pH-metric titration. The modified material exhibits good antibacterial properties against Gram-positive bacteria Staphylococcus aureus.

Knitting is a versatile technology which offers a large portfolio of products and solutions of interest in heart valve (HV) tissue engineering (TE). One of the main advantages of knitting is its ability to construct complex shapes and structures by precisely assembling the yarns in the desired position. With this in mind, knitting could be employed to construct a HV scaffold that closely resembles the authentic valve. This has the potential to reproduce the anisotropic structure that is characteristic of the heart valve with the yarns, in particular the 3-layered architecture of the leaflets. These yarns can provide oriented growth of cells lengthwise and consequently enable the deposition of extracellular matrix (ECM) proteins in an oriented manner. This technique, therefore, has a potential to provide a functional knitted scaffold, but to achieve that textile engineers need to gain a basic understanding of structural and mechanical aspects of the heart valve and in addition, tissue engineers must acquire the knowledge of tools and capacities that are essential in knitting technology. The aim of this review is to provide a platform to consolidate these two fields as well as to enable an efficient communication and cooperation among these two research areas.

The ferulic acid (FA) is a natural antioxidant, abundantly present in plants, which acts as the plant's immune system. In order to take advantage of its properties, a method has been developed, which combines antioxidant FA with bio‐based biodegradable poly(lactic acid) fibers and biocompatible hydrophilic polyallylamine, enabling the production of versatile base material that could be used for active anti‐inflammatory wound dressings. The fibers are first subjected to aminolysis in order to obtain amino moieties on the surface, able to react with the molecules of FA. Next, the FA was attached to the aminolyzed fibers surface with use of 1‐ethyl‐3–(3‐dimethylaminopropyl) carbodiimide and N‐hydroxysuccinimide. The anti‐inflammatory properties of the modified fibers were assessed using 2,2‐diphenyl‐1‐picrylhydrazyl radical scavenging assay. Presence of FA on the fibers’ surface was investigated through X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy analysis and Folin–Ciocalteu (total phenolic content) test. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2017, 134, 45112.