The architectural change of the shell forming block from linear to V-shaped accelerates micellar disassembly but slows the complete enzymatic degradation of the amphiphiles.

The architectural change of the shell forming block from linear to V-shaped accelerates micellar disassembly but slows the complete enzymatic degradation of the amphiphiles. Biomacromolecules. 2020 Aug 24;: Authors: Segal M, Ozery L, Slor G, Wagle SS, Ehm T, Beck R, Amir RJ Abstract Tuning the enzymatic degradation and disassembly rates of polymeric amphiphiles and their assemblies is crucial for designing enzyme-responsive nanocarriers for controlled drug delivery applications. The common methods to control the enzymatic degradation of amphiphilic polymers are to tune the molecular weights and ratios of the hydrophilic and hydrophobic blocks. In addition, to these approaches, the architecture of the hydrophilic block can also serve as a tool to tune enzymatic degradation and disassembly. To gain deeper understanding of the effect of the molecular architecture of the hydrophilic block we prepared two types of well-defined PEG-dendron amphiphiles bearing linear or V-shaped PEG chains as the hydrophilic blocks. The high molecular precision of these amphiphiles, which emerges from the utilization of dendrons as the hydrophobic blocks allowed us to study the self-assembly and enzymatic degradation and disassembly of the two types of amphiphiles with high resolution. Interestingly, the micelles of the V-shaped amphiphiles were significantly smaller and disassembled faster than those of the amphiphiles based on linear PEG. However, the com...
Source: Biomacromolecules - Category: Biochemistry Authors: Tags: Biomacromolecules Source Type: research