Sodium Polyacrylate Hydrogel

The micrograph shown here is of Hydrated Sodium Polyacrylate Hydrogel. The sample itself was sourced from a children’s toy (dyed sodium polyacrylate hydrogel beads). The bead was cut into a hemisphere using an exacto knife and mounted using a mixture of tissue tek and colloidal graphite (70:30 ratio) onto a cryo stub. The sample was then plunged freezed in LN2, fractured, sublimated and coated with 5 nm of Au/Pd using the Quorum PP3010 cryo system. This sample was then loaded onto a Quorum cold stage and imaged within a Zeiss Evo. A beam energy of 6.00kV was used with a probe current of 16 pA.