Swelling was performed on dried membranes, normal ones and dried gel to unravel the role of crosslinking and degradation on polymeric structure during drying and hydration process. The comparison of the swelling results suggested that the network were formed only by PVP molecules. The complex mixture of macromolecules showed a irreversible behavior upon drying and hydration, probably as a function of PEG and/or agar entangling in effective physical crosslink. The best network regularity and useful properties was found at 20-30 kGy. (C) 1999 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.