Mandal, SujataHwang, Sangchul2023-05-102023-05-102023-04Mandal, S., & Hwang, S. (2023). Guar gum, a versatile natural polymer to improve human health and water quality. Poster presented at the Health Scholar Showcase, Translational Health Research Center, San Marcos, Texas.https://hdl.handle.net/10877/16752Humans are constantly exposed to hazardous chemicals present in water, air, food, and soil which can lead to a multitude of negative health impacts. Advanced materials can play a key role in preventing these impacts and biocompatible hydrogels prepared from natural polymers have gained popularity in recent years as high-performance materials for environmental contaminant remediation, drug delivery, and tissue engineering. Hydrogels possess three-dimensional network structure and can easily absorb and retain water. Guar gum (GG), a natural non-ionic, hydrophilic, abundant low-cost polysaccharide is an excellent candidate for gel fabrication. Dye- contamination in water supplies due to industrial effluents is one of the major water pollution issues and continues to be a significant public health concern given their potential toxicity to humans under acute or prolonged exposures. As a result, the development of technologies capable of removing organic contaminants especially industrial dyes like Malachite green (MG), Crystal violet (CV), Congo Red (CR) etc. has drawn the attention of numerous researchers So, it is imperative to develop ecofriendly multifunctional hydrogels which can positively impact human health by preventing exposure to environmental pollutants and making them suitable for injectable drug delivery. In our study, we report the development of cost-effective ecofriendly Guar Gum based hydrogel which displayed remarkable toxic dye removal property, self healing property and injectable property.Image1 page1 file (.pdf)enwater qualityhealthnatural polymerPoster