The swelling ratio of the chitin/CMC hydrogels in distilled water at 37 _C. Generally, superabsorbent can absorb hundreds of times its own weight of water. All the samples exhibited high equilibrium swelling ratio, indicating that the chitin/CMC hydrogels were superabsorbent hydrogels. The maximum swelling ratio of the hydrogels was more than 1200, which was absolutely higher than that prepared from chitin or cellulose derivative