hydrogels formed from dendritic polyglycerol and polyethylene glycol can be used as a biosensing (characterized by using streptavidin as biological probe) and antiviral (by incorporating sulfate functional group to the hydrogel) platforms. In case of biosensing application, the hydrogel shows high encapsulation efficiency and sensing performance. As for the antiviral application, the binding performance to herpes simplex virus type 1 of sulfated hydrogels is better than of the non-sulfated versions. besides, the high network flexibility helps improve the binding efficiency.
