College of Chemical Engineering & Materials Science, Quanzhou Normal University, Quanzhou, 362000, China.
School of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, 62 Nanyang Drive Singapore, Singapore, 637459, Singapore.
Macromol Rapid Commun. 2017 Nov;38(21). doi: 10.1002/marc.201700410. Epub 2017 Sep 12.
With the advancement of polymer engineering, complex star-shaped polymer architectures can be synthesized with ease, bringing about a host of unique properties and applications. The polymer arms can be functionalized with different chemical groups to fine-tune the response behavior or be endowed with targeting ligands or stimuli responsive moieties to control its physicochemical behavior and self-organization in solution. Rheological properties of these solutions can be modulated, which also facilitates the control of the diffusion of the drug from these star-based nanocarriers. However, these star-shaped polymers designed for drug delivery are still in a very early stage of development. Due to the sheer diversity of macromolecules that can take on the star architectures and the various combinations of functional groups that can be cross-linked together, there remain many structure-property relationships which have yet to be fully established. This review aims to provide an introductory perspective on the basic synthetic methods of star-shaped polymers, the properties which can be controlled by the unique architecture, and also recent advances in drug delivery applications related to these star candidates.
随着聚合物工程的进步，复杂的星形聚合物结构可以很容易地被合成，带来了一系列独特的性质和应用。聚合物臂可以用不同的化学基团官能化，以微调响应行为，或赋予靶向配体或刺激响应部分，以控制其物理化学行为和在溶液中的自组织。这些溶液的流变性质可以被调节，这也有助于控制药物从这些基于星形的纳米载体中的扩散。然而，这些用于药物输送的星形聚合物仍处于非常早期的开发阶段。由于可以采用星形结构的大分子的多样性，以及可以交联在一起的各种功能基团的组合，仍有许多结构-性质关系尚未完全建立。本综述旨在提供关于星形聚合物的基本合成方法、通过独特结构可以控制的性质以及与这些星形候选物相关的药物输送应用的最新进展的介绍性观点。
