there are some reports which used Glutar Aldehyde as a crosslinking agent for PVA while they did not use any catalysts such as HCl. So they crosslinked PVA by heat treatments such as @ 150 C for 1 hour. However, they did not mention details about the proper amount of Glutar aldehyde.
you can put the glutaraldehyd in a plate (petry dish) and put in the desiccator and place the PVA film on top of the plate on the membrane of desicator and heat the desicator to 150C.
Glutaraldehyde needs to be purified (distilled) first, as it contains the low molecular weight polymer as an impurity. Really old solutions are opaque because of the presence of the higher molecular weight polymer species.
Diffusivity of the monomer should be sufficient to penetrate a somewhat swollen PVA matrix. It is way more reactive than the polymer species.
Check this publication
https://doi.org/10.1002/app.29263
we investigated the crosslinking of poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) by glutaraldehyde in the absence of an acid catalyst and organic solvents to improve the water resistance of the hydrophilic biocompatible polymer. Membranes prepared at 40°C showed a maximum crosslinking density for low glutaraldehyde content namely, 0.04 wt % in the spreading solution. Higher amounts of the crosslinker led to the branching of PVA.
Stock solution of 50% (w/w) glutaraldehyde used. Added in amount required for desired ratio of glutaraldehyde:PVA to PVA solution. PVA final content 4%.
Solution placed into Petri dishes and solvent evaporated (various temperatures tried) to cross-link and form membrane simultaneously.
And the attached compared product prepared at two different pH values. They ran the reaction then harvested the gel from the solution, washed with acetone, filtered, and dried.
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