then washed with neutral saline 10 0 l on an orbital shaker after approximately 24 hours the saline was drained using a sieve and the gel washed with 0 025 m phosphate buffered saline 3 5 l at a ph of 7 6 for about 24 hours the gel 1 19 kg and ph 7 2 was then removed from the wash the fpc was 0 53 a sample of the product was autoclaved at 121 u00b0 c for 15 minutes the theological data shown in table 1 and observation indicated that the gel was elastic cohesive and soft this example illustrates the preparation of a gel with an ipc of 4 8 and a dvs pol ratio of 1 96 to a 0 2m naoh solution 189 63 g was slowly added high mw bacterially fermented sodium hyaluronate 10 27 g with rapid mechanical stirring giving a polymer solution with an ipc of 4 8 after 90 minutes a solution of dvs 0 080 ml in ipa 0 920 ml was slowly added by pipette 5 u00d7 u02dc 0 2 ml over one minute to the polymer solution the reaction mixture was stirred for 15 minutes and was then poured into a pyrex u00ae tray 23 u00d7 18 u00d7 6 5 cm and sealed with a plastic cover the reaction mixture was stored at room temperature for 4 hours affording a gel and then transferred to a glass container containing neutral saline 3 0 l to which was added 2 m hcl solution 36 00 ml it was then agitated on an orbital shaker at room temperature for 24 hours the wash solution was drained.