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Synthesis and characteristics of interpenetrating polymer network hydrogels based on konjac glucomannan with different molecular weights and poly(acrylic acid) Xue Yao1,a, Xuegang Luo1,b and Benchao Han1,c 1Engineering Research Center of Biomass Materials, Ministry of Education, Southwest University of Science and Technology, Mianyang 621010, PR China aemail: yaoxue.0612@; b* email: lxg@; c email: hanbenchao@126.com Keywords: Konjac glucomannan; Poly(acrylic acid); Interpenetrating polymer network; Enzymatic degradation; Molecular weight Abstract. Konjac glucomannan with different molecular weights/poly(acrylic acid) hydrogels were prepared in this paper. The structure of the IPN hydrogels was characterized by FT-IR and SEM. The swelling ratio of these hydrogels showed they had pH-sensitive properties and the enzymatic degradation tests showed the hydrogels retain the enzymatic degradation character of KGM. Furthermore, hydrogel composed of native KGM degraded sharply in enzymatic degradation test and it had bigger swelling ratio and weight loss ratio than those hydrogels which composed of lower molecular weights KGM. Therefore, hydrogels composed of lower molecular weight might release drug more stable when they were used as drug carrier. Introduction KGM is a high molecular weight water-soluble non-ionic polysaccharide found in tubers of Amorphophallus konjac[1-2]. KGM with various molecular weights can show different physicochemical properties[3-4] and physiological function[5]. Polymer molecular weight has an influence on their efficacy in vitro and in vivo when they are used as the drug delivery systems. For example, polymeric nanoparticles based on low molecular weight (MW) chitosan exhibit higher transfection efficiency in vitro and in vivo than those made from high molecular weight chitosan[6]. In this paper, KGM with various molecular weights were used to prepare composite hydrogels drug carrier, and the hydrogels were d