title: Preparation and cupric ion release behavior of Cu/LDPE porous composites with tunable pore morphology for intrauterine devices.
abstract: Copper/low-density polyethylene (Cu/LDPE) porous composites are novel materials for copper-containing intrauterine devices (Cu-IUDs). Here we report a method, i.e., by changing the mass ratio of two kinds of porogens that have different melting points through the combined techniques of injection molding and particulate leaching, to prepare the Cu/LDPE porous composites with tunable pore morphology. After these Cu/LDPE porous composites with different pore morphologies were obtained, the influences of pore morphologies on their cupric ion release behaviors were studied. The results show that the pore morphology has great influence on the cupric ion release behavior of Cu/LDPE porous composites. This phenomenon is caused by the different influences of different pore morphologies on the effective porosity and the surface hydrophilicity. And those results can be applied to guide the fabrication of Cu/LDPE porous composite Cu-IUDs with minimal weight at an appropriate cupric ion release rate.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Material Processing and Die & Mould Technology, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430074, PR China.
authors.forename: Lian
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Xiao
authors.forename: Xianping
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Xia
authors.forename: Changsheng
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Xie
authors.forename: Man
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Ge
authors.forename: Cheng
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Xiao
authors.forename: Shuizhou
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Cai
mesh_terms: D003300:Copper / Q000378:metabolism*; D008401:Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry; D007435:Intrauterine Devices, Copper; D008855:Microscopy, Electron, Scanning; D020959:Polyethylene; D017550:Spectroscopy, Fourier Transform Infrared
chemical_list: D003300:Copper; D020959:Polyethylene