Chemical and biological characterization of sulfated chitosan oligomer as heparin mimics

In the present study, chitosan oligomer was modified to sulfated chitosan oligomer (ShCsO) to mimic heparin. Its chemical structure was determined by infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), X-ray diffractometry (XRD), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), and thermogravimetric analysis. The results showed that the FT-IR spectrum band at 799 cm−1 corresponds to C–O–S and that at 1212 cm−1 corresponds to S=O bond stretching, which prove that the sulfate groups are incorporated into chitosan oligomer successfully. The antimicrobial activity of ShCsO against to Bacillus subtilis in 1% concentration was 89.1 ± 1.7%. The IC50 (μg/ml) of ShCsO was 67.75, 56.07, 85.47, and 84.68 for A2780, MCF-7, DU-145, and HepG2, respectively. The results show that this newly synthesized material is a potential candidate to heparin-like chitosan derivatives. According to the literature, it was the first time that chitosan oligomer was modified to mimic heparin.