Posel Zbyšek, Posocco Paola
Department of Informatics, Faculty of Science, Jan Evangelista Purkyně University in Ústí nad Labem, 40096 Ústí nad Labem, Czech Republic.
Department of Engineering and Architecture, University of Trieste, 34127 Trieste, Italy.
Nanomaterials (Basel). 2019 Oct 24;9(11):1514. doi: 10.3390/nano9111514.
Nanogels are chemically crosslinked polymeric nanoparticles endowed with high encapsulation ability, tunable size, ease of preparation, and responsiveness to external stimuli. The presence of specific functional groups on their surfaces provides an opportunity to tune their surface properties and direct their behavior. In this work, we used mesoscale modeling to describe conformational and mechanical properties of nanogel surfaces formed by crosslinked polyethylene glycol and polyethyleneimine, and grafted by charged alkylamine brushes of different lengths. Simulations show that both number of chains per area and chain length can be used to tune the properties of the coating. Properly selecting these two parameters allows switching from a hydrated, responsive coating to a dried, highly charged layer. The results also suggest that the scaling behavior of alkylamine brushes, e.g., the transition from a mushroom to semi-dilute brush, is only weakly coupled with the shielding ability of the coating and much more with its compressibility.
纳米凝胶是化学交联的聚合物纳米颗粒，具有高封装能力、可调节的尺寸、易于制备以及对外部刺激的响应性。其表面特定官能团的存在为调节其表面性质和引导其行为提供了机会。在这项工作中，我们使用中尺度建模来描述由交联聚乙二醇和聚乙烯亚胺形成并接枝不同长度带电烷基胺刷的纳米凝胶表面的构象和力学性质。模拟表明，每单位面积的链数和链长都可用于调节涂层的性质。适当选择这两个参数可实现从水合响应涂层到干燥高电荷层的转变。结果还表明，烷基胺刷的标度行为，例如从蘑菇状到半稀溶液刷的转变，与涂层的屏蔽能力仅有微弱关联，而与其压缩性关联更大。
