Fatigue resistance
of hydrogels is critical to their applications
in load-bearing sites of soft tissues that are usually subjected to
continuous loadings, such as joint cartilage. However, hydrogels usually
swell under physiological conditions and exhibit inevitable fatigue
during excessive mechanical loadings. Here we show that hydrogels
cross-linked by multivalent host–guest interactions can effectively
dissipate a large fraction of the loading energy (>50%) under excessive
compressions (over 80% strain, 1000 cycles) despite their high water
contents (95%) under physiological conditions. No fatigue is observed
in such highly swollen hydrogels during continuous cyclic compressions.
We demonstrate that such hydrogels can be used as 3D cell carriers
for excessive mechanical stimulation of the encapsulated stem cells,
making them promising soft biomaterials for tissue engineering.